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 UNIVERSITY OF 
 
 ILLINOIS LIBRARY 
 
 AT UR3ANA-CHAMPAIGN 
 
YET HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 
 
■ ■ 
 
 He Was a Gentleman 
 
 by Grace J. Austin 
 
 Copyright - 1940 
 
 by Grace J. Austin 
 
PRINTED IX THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 
 
 BY PANTAGRAPH PRESS, BLOOMIXGTON, ILLINOIS 
 
9/3 
 
 \u763 
 
 7 
 
 
 DEDICATION 
 
 This little book, wholly fictional in char- 
 acters and locality, is dedicated to Future 
 Elephant Victories; in Illinois, and in 
 the entire nation. 
 
 Ob 
 
 (- 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 
 in 2012 with funding from 
 
 University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/yethewasgentlemaOOaust 
 
Chapter I 
 
 CAPTAIN PETER FENTON WHO 
 LIES BURIED HERE FOUGHT FOR 
 HIS COUNTRY IN THE REVOLUTION 
 AND YET HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 
 
 1783 
 
 This inscription has stood for many a long year on 
 an ancient stone in the old burying ground at Plymouth, 
 Massachusetts. 
 
 Fentons had been gone from Plymouth for nearly as 
 long a time, but that did not mean they had left the United 
 States. They were a pioneering family, and early in the 
 1800's they had settled Fentonia, on the banks of the 
 Sangamon river, in Illinois. 
 
 For more than 100 years no Fenton looked at his an- 
 cestor's grave and inscription. Then with the touring 
 power of the automobile which gives the restless American 
 some of the thrills for which his forbears had to take 
 sea-crossings and land expeditions, groups of Fentons came 
 every now and then to the old cemetery. 
 
 There would be a grandfather or two that had fought 
 with Illinois regiments in the Civil war. Fenton men had 
 been Spanish or World war soldiers — plenty of the car- 
 drivers were in this last group. One and all of these 
 soldier visitors were outraged by that distant grandparent's 
 epitaph : 
 
 "Gosh darn!" and stronger epithets sounded. "Of 
 course he was a gentleman! Why in thunder did they 
 say 'yet' ?" And there was no one in the Plymouth bury- 
 ing ground to answer the demand. 
 
 3 
 
4 YET 
 
 It was more than 150 years after the Revolutionary 
 Captain died that Peter Fenton, millionaire oil well owner 
 and politician — incidentally, the great man and Czar of 
 Fentonia, looked up one October night at the framed en- 
 larged photograph of his ancestor's tombstone which hung 
 above his desk. Unexpectedly, he got a thrust from its 
 message. He, too, was a fighter and leader. With all things 
 counted, was he a gentleman? 
 
 He decided he would have to know, if it were the last 
 thing in life he ever did. 
 
Chapter II 
 
 I imagine you have set up a chess board. You know 
 how to place your kings and queens and bishops. Your 
 knights will gallop to their right places, and after the 
 pawns, there is still a place between. Often I have thought 
 that Fentonia, with its north and its south sides, repre- 
 sents pretty well a chess board. There are bishops and 
 gallant knights, there are kings and queens — and God help 
 us, — some such pitiful pawns. 
 
 Three Fenton brothers, sons of the Captain in the 
 Plymouth burying ground, founded the settlement; buying 
 the ground it is said, with beads from the Indians. There 
 was the basis, too, of a Revolutionary war land grant to 
 their father. 
 
 It would take a five foot shelf of books — dry reading, 
 too, at times — to chronicle the happenings at Fentonia 
 from 1800 to the present. The story had better start 
 abruptly, in the modern manner. Only, if anything is 
 puzzling, it is to be remembered that quite likely the key 
 is to be searched for back in the early 19th century. Just 
 as on the day when an Indian took his first bead, the 
 fortunes of Fentonia still rest mostly in the hands of a 
 group of Fenton men. 
 
 Peter, John and Reuben Fenton were the first to come 
 west, and there are descendants in plenty, bearing the same 
 names now. Peter, the eldest, brought a New England 
 wife with him. He was the leader of the group, and chose 
 the more fertile acres on the south side of the river. His 
 wife died, leaving a son Peter, and twice after that, the 
 first western Peter Fenton went back to Massachusetts for 
 a wife. The second time he said gravely, "The west is hard 
 on women and oxen," and that saying became a familiar 
 
 5 
 
6 YET 
 
 proverb in all that bay region. The third wife bore him 
 seven children, and outlived him by a score of years. 
 
 That first Peter had some knowledge of surveying. It 
 was he who marked out the chess board. Main street was 
 to run along the south side — his side — of the river. He 
 allotted a block for a courthouse, for he already planned 
 to make the place a county seat. 
 
 On the north side he set apart generous acres for an 
 "academy" — it was a later Peter who founded a college on 
 the site. He noted where the river hastened its course 
 enough to turn a mill wheel, and marked "Mill-site" on 
 his first plan. He marked "Fenton Mansion" on a sunny 
 slope on his south side of the town, although it was forty 
 years before a home really worthy of that name was built. 
 John and Reuben were content with home sites on the 
 north. A rope ferry for many years was the only bridge 
 across the river, which is now spanned by a half dozen 
 railroad and passenger bridges. 
 
 Having the original landmarks somewhat settled, it is 
 high time to call on the present Peter Fenton, in his office 
 or library at Fenton mansion. A buxom housekeeper, Sarah, 
 has just rapped on the library door, opening it promptly 
 to say, 
 
 "Lady to see you, sir. I'll show her in here." Peter 
 Fenton nodded, hardly raising his eyes from the work 
 before him. The door opened and closed, and Fenton rose 
 from his desk for a meeting which both were not to forget. 
 
 On Fenton's side, he saw a small woman in her late 
 twenties, quietly and economically dressed — even in that 
 moment he saw a mended place on her gray glove. But 
 what he saw for remembrance were her blue eyes and her 
 smile. He could tell at once she was a little frightened. It 
 was not much wonder. From her five feet, his six feet four 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 7 
 
 was an imposing height. She saw his slightly graying, rest- 
 less hair and his kindly brown eyes. 
 
 The woman walked lightly over to Peter Fenton, with- 
 out waiting to be met halfway. She held out her hand 
 and said, 
 
 "I am Mrs. William Harney, wife of the new president 
 this year at Cartwright college, across the river. My hus- 
 band is faced with serious trouble. He had engagements 
 this afternoon which he could not break, so I agreed to 
 come to you, as the president of the trustees." Her voice 
 kept quite steady, but Fenton noticed that she was rather 
 short of breath. He placed her in a comfortable arm chair, 
 and asked for all the particulars. 
 
 "You will remember the professor of economics re- 
 signed late last fall, and on rather short notice my husband 
 hired Dr. I. I. Smokas, with degrees from Columbia and 
 New York University, to take the place. He has been 
 giving rather spectacular lectures and has gained quite a 
 following. This week Mr. Harney learned that Smokas 
 had been inviting groups of boys to his apartment, giving 
 them wine — of course entirely contrary to the rules — and 
 setting forth to them heretical views about the government. 
 Smokas was called in to the president's office and asked 
 to present his resignation, to take effect at the close of 
 the semester." 
 
 She paused, and drew from her handbag a crumpled 
 sheet of paper, 
 
 "When my husband was in college they called such 
 things as these 'boguses'. I don't know what is the right 
 thing to name them by now. This morning there were 
 hundreds of them pasted — or glued — on every building 
 of the college — on sidewalks, on windows, and I think 
 what hurt Mr. Harney worst, on the outside cover of the 
 
8 YET 
 
 chapel Bible. Nothing had been said to the student body 
 of Dr. Smokas's dismissal, so he must have told it himself." 
 Peter Fenton took the mimeographed sheet she handed 
 him and gave it close attention. At the top was a crude 
 drawing, yet done with a certain power. It showed an 
 open doorway, with a man in recognizable likeness to 
 Smokas about to come in. Holding the door by the handle 
 was a thin sparse figure which did not need to be labelled 
 Harney. Underneath in large letters was scrawled : 
 
 UNLESS SMOKAS COMES IN TO STAY, HARNEY 
 GOES OUT. STUDENT BODY 
 
 Fenton looked up from the paper and smiled at the 
 woman's anxious face, 
 
 "It's odd you and I have not met before. I remember 
 I was in New York in the fall when the trustees gave a 
 reception in honor of you and Dr. Harney. 
 
 "Now please don't look so worried. I can see at the 
 very first that the trustees have done wrong to place the 
 burden of hiring and firing on one man's shoulders alone. 
 Something shall be done about that. But rest assured, your 
 husband's authority in this Smokas matter will be firmly 
 upheld." Mrs. Harney drew a long breath and leaned 
 back in her chair, looking so white that Peter Fenton was 
 startled. He went across the room rapidly, opening a cup- 
 board in the wall, and returning with a small glass of liquid 
 of beautiful color. He laughed, 
 
 "Perhaps you will set me down as another Smokas, but 
 I assure you I want you to take this as medicine. I think 
 you need it." She smiled and took the glass like an obedient 
 child. 
 
 "Now may I have the pleasure of taking you home in 
 my car? What's that? — You 'walked over!' Why, woman, 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 9 
 
 it's miles across to Cartwright! — Look here, are you sure 
 your husband hasn't heard the fable about me; that I 'can- 
 not refuse a woman?' Well, I certainly shall not begin by 
 refusing you." 
 
Chapter III 
 
 Two fraternities divided the Greek-minded boys at 
 Cartwright college; the Delts and the Sigs. The line of 
 Peter Fentons had always been Delts, while their Fenton 
 cousins were Sigs, thus dividing the family wisely in fra- 
 ternal matters. 
 
 After leaving Mrs. Harney at her home, Peter Fenton 
 stopped his car at the Delta chapter house. He went into 
 the smokers' den, and found just the group of seniors that 
 he wanted. Stretching back in a chair that was a favorite 
 of his, he demanded, 
 
 "Now give me all the low-down on Smokas." He got 
 it. These were not boys who had pasted a cartoon on the 
 Bible, but on the other side, they could see Smokas' view: 
 
 "They say he has a cast-iron contract, Mr. Fenton." 
 Fenton shook his head, 
 
 "Contracts may be violated by misbehaviour. Ben- 
 ning, give me your opinion." The tall senior, oldest of 
 the student group, reflected a moment, 
 
 "Smokas is smart — he's modern — he doesn't really mean 
 to poison the boys. I think his idea is more like someone 
 who teases cats and dogs, to watch their reactions — a mean 
 thing to do, I've always maintained! — I tell you, Mr. 
 Fenton, from the time he got here, he's made me think 
 of that old saying, 'Scratch a Russian and you get a Tartar.' ' 
 
 Fenton got to his feet promptly, 
 
 "Thanks, boys. Think I've got just what I wanted. 
 Where did you say he hangs out? With the Kirillov family, 
 down by the tracks — must be for practice in speaking Rus- 
 sian. Well, boys; show Harney you will stand by him. 
 This business will blow over." He was away, to the next 
 part of his plan. 
 
 10 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 11 
 
 Smokas, the economist, was taking long strides along 
 the river road in Fentonia when a car stopped by him. The 
 driver, Peter Fenton, leaned out and said, 
 
 "Dr. Smokas? My name is Fenton. Willing to come for 
 a ride with me?" The young man scrambled with alacrity 
 into the seat by the driver, 
 
 "I didn't know you knew me, Mr. Fenton. I've often 
 heard of you." 
 
 "Just a mutual second-hand acquaintance, then," Peter 
 admitted. He then gave the young man five miles or so 
 of pleasant driving on Fentonia' s notably good roads, show- 
 ing off the town as if to a stranger. Finally Smokas broke 
 in huskily, 
 
 "Mr. Fenton, you don't have to sell Fentonia to me. I 
 think it's a great place. I don't want to leave it. But if 
 you are going to agree with Harney that I have to, I think 
 I'd rather not ride any more." 
 
 Peter Fenton probably drove for a half mile before 
 he answered, 
 
 "I don't want to have you leave Fentonia. We need all 
 the modern thinking and sharp minds that we can get, 
 to live here. But sharp tools are sometimes safer in one 
 place than another. Children are very poor judges of how 
 things should be handled." Smokas twisted his mouth 
 around, admitting to himself that Fenton had scored, but 
 said nothing. After another silence, Fenton said, 
 
 "I hold the controlling power in the Fenton Hosiery 
 Mills — there's the smoke from their big chimney stack. 
 On that very spot my great grandfather set up the first 
 grist mill in this part of Illinois. I have long wanted to 
 put in a first class personnel man, to study factory problems, 
 but they are hard to find. Would you consider a post like 
 that, with about the same salary Cartwright was paying?" 
 
12 YET 
 
 A modern young man from the eastern universities, 
 full of theories and degrees, is hard to "flabbergast". But 
 Smokas sat by Peter Fenton; a thoroughly "flabbergasted" 
 youth. Finally he found his voice, 
 
 "You mean you are willing to turn me into your factory, 
 when I suppose they have been telling you I'm a firebrand 
 and a bomb, combined?" Peter laughed out loud, 
 
 "As I read you, you are a square man. I think you 
 may have jumped to some wrong conclusions, and I'd like 
 to have the pleasure of talking things out with you. But 
 I'm fond of the factory and the workers. Many of them are 
 third generation in the mills. I want to have an open 
 mind, too. If you can prove to me there are things I've left 
 undone, I promise to meet you half way." Fenton drew 
 up at a gas station at this opportune moment. The young 
 Russian had time to get his breath. After the order for 
 gas and oil was given, he held out his hand, 
 
 "Mr. Fenton, I'll be proud to work for you. And I 
 won't be stiff-necked if we have differences of opinion." 
 Peter laughed whole-heartedly, 
 
 "That's great. — And now let's go out and feed Plymouth 
 Rock, and then go to the Illinois hotel and feed ourselves. 
 That'll just about bind the contract." 
 
 " 'Feed Plymouth Rock?' " Smokas repeated, in a mysti- 
 fied tone. 
 
 "You'll see. Let me buy a couple of loaves of sliced 
 bread at that bakery." The car was started, and both men 
 sat silently as it followed the southern river road. 
 
 As they passed the offices of the conservative "Fentonia 
 Morning Times," Peter Fenton remarked, 
 
 "I wonder if you've made up your mind yet about our 
 newspapers? I'm not so sure that the "Evening Tocsin,' 
 over across the river, is what you really prefer. I under- 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 13 
 
 stand The Tocsin has a new managing editor coming down 
 this week from Chicago. He may improve the paper. I 
 believe his name is Cleon Telucha." 
 
 This was certainly an evening of bombshells for I. I. 
 Smokas. He came as near to a girlish hysterical shriek as 
 a grown young man can, 
 
 "'Cleon Telucha!' — Why, he's a sort of blood-cousin 
 of mine! We spent the year together, when we were both 
 fourteen. I'd lost all track of him. Mr. Fenton, if there's 
 one person in the universe I'd rather see than others, it's 
 Cleon!" There was genuine awe in his tone when he 
 added, "It does seem as though wonders were never going 
 to cease!" 
 
 Just then Peter Fenton slowed his car to drive under 
 an archway labelled "Sarah Fenton Park". "She was my 
 grandmother," he grinned to Smokas. "The park was her 
 idea forty years ago or so. I'm pretty proud of it." He 
 followed the curving, landscaped drives well into the center 
 of the park. 
 
 "Here comes Plymouth Rock — otherwise 'Roxie' "! 
 
 A large gray elephant came swinging across the en- 
 closure, waving her trunk as she came. She knew ahead 
 just how good those soft bread-slices were going to taste, 
 as a tid-bit after her supper of a half ton of hay. 
 
 "Ever since I was a boy I've liked elephants. Never 
 missed a circus in twenty miles of me. I have thousands 
 of elephant figures of all shapes and sizes, in a room at my 
 home. But Roxie does me more good than all of them put 
 together. I suppose she was named 'Roxie' before she left 
 India. At any rate that is the name she answers to. But our 
 folks came from Plymouth Rock, or thereabouts, and I like 
 to consider that's her full name." — With one of his light- 
 ning changes of topic, he squared on the young man, 
 
14 YET 
 
 "By the way, speaking of names, what does 'I. I.' stand 
 for, in yours?" Smokas hesitated perceptibly, 
 
 "I do not use the names, but as I judge is the case 
 with you, they follow my father and grandfather, Ivan 
 Ivanovitch." 
 
 "I see," Peter said slowly. "But you are an American 
 citizen?" 
 
 "Yes. Born here." 
 
 "How about John Ivan Smokas? You don't have to 
 have legislative permission for translation. Sounds better 
 on a ticket." 
 
 "A ticket, Mr. Fenton! What do you mean, politics? 
 — Oh, sir, I'd better be driven back to my room, if you 
 don't mind. I'm altogether too full of new ideas, to add 
 on a hotel dinner." 
 
Chapter IV 
 
 Well back from the river on the south side of Fentonia 
 stands St. Paul's church. There were not lacking some of 
 the malicious to say the Fentons would have named it "St. 
 Peter's", for the founder of the family, if they had quite 
 dared. 
 
 However, quite as many Fentons attended the First 
 Congregational church, on the north side. — And if at- 
 tendance is a measure of devotion, St. Aloysius' church, 
 with its slender spire and three harmonizing bells would 
 have counted the most faithful worshipers in the city. 
 
 "Fentonia is a good place; no mistaking it." 
 
 "Too good," growled Cleon Telucha, the new managing 
 editor of the Daily Tocsin, in the respite time of an after- 
 noon paper, when the sheet is on the street. Tobacco in 
 several forms was scattered over the sanctum desk. Around 
 it was gathered John Smokas, Searles, the chemistry man at 
 the college, and, yes, actually, young Rector Wallace Brooks, 
 from St. Paul's church. 
 
 The door swung open, in accord with its printed invita- 
 tion on the outside, and two of the most radiant girls pos- 
 sible to find in two hemispheres looked in. They giggled, 
 — it must be admitted. But since they did not also chew 
 gum, the giggles can be forgiven. 
 
 Where they had possibly — and fearfully — expected to 
 find one young man, — here were four! No wonder the 
 famous Fenton twins giggled. Cleon, as a sort of official 
 host, lowered his feet from the desk and stood up. He 
 approached the girls, — the men testified later that he even 
 smiled. But they also declared that he stuttered when he 
 demanded, 
 
 "What can I do for you?" 
 
 15 
 
16 YET 
 
 "Do you buy poetry?" Iona Fenton asked timidly. 
 
 "She doesn't mean books of it," Leona put in hastily. 
 'She means, could we write some for the Tocsin, about 
 Fenton Park, and Reunions, and Moonlight on the River — 
 and, Oh, just lots of local subjects? We have brought some 
 to show you, if you'd care to look at them." As she went 
 on, encouraged by his smile, she grew more courageous. 
 Her blue eyes shone, and she held out a hand pleadingly 
 to Cleon. 
 
 "Go to it!" muttered Smokas. 
 
 "Why — er- er- we have no budget to pay for such 
 poems, but quite likely we could find space to print them." 
 
 "Ask for pictures, goose!" coached Smokas. Cleon rose 
 like a fish to the bait. 
 
 "Your visit has given so much pleasure. We will con- 
 sider the poems at once, for the Sunday edition. Have you 
 girls some pictures of yourselves? They would make a good 
 feature, with the poems." Shrieks came from both girls. 
 They whispered together, and finally Iona opened her bag. 
 There was the picture! But her eyes shone with mischief 
 as she clutched it with a mighty grip, 
 
 "There's a quiz on this. Which girl is which? I'm Iona. 
 You'll have to earn it, if we let you have it." Cleon drew 
 a long breath and looked at the picture with the keen 
 eyes of a man that reads five point type. He studied the 
 eyebrows and lip-lines. Finally he decided, 
 
 "This one is you," he said with confidence, and he was 
 right. Both girls were surprised. Every friend who had 
 seen the picture had guessed wrongly. They looked ques- 
 tioningly at each other, then Iona shyly held out the picture. 
 
 "We play fair. Thank you for taking the poems," and 
 the two were gone. Only their little pile of poems and the 
 picture was left to prove their visit was real. 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 17 
 
 All the men were silent for a moment. Then John 
 Smokas rose, 
 
 "That was really something in our young lives. Think 
 I'll walk over to the park and feed Roxie. I seem to need 
 exercise." All of the group apparently had been blown out 
 of a mood of gossiping composure. In five minutes Cleon 
 was alone and even he had put on his coat to go. He wrote 
 the engraver's order for a four column cut of the girls, and 
 stood, pawing over the poetry sheets aimlessly. All at once 
 he whistled, 
 
 "Here's the one to go under the picture, and my dear 
 ladies, I think you've cooked yourself a pretty kettle of fish." 
 Telucha had once worked on a college paper. Not a fra- 
 ternity man himself, he still understood the layout. He 
 could imagine these girls, pet nieces of the president of the 
 college trustees, and "legacies" from many sororities of their 
 mothers and cousins and aunts, simply swamped with at- 
 tentions. 
 
 "Suppose they know what will happen?" He pondered, 
 looking at the picture. Then he added, "I'll bet they do. 
 I'll bet they've got a principle, and they'll stick it out!" He 
 folded the little poem and put it in his pocket, but at dinner 
 at his lone table read it again; 
 
 SORORITY 
 
 Sister dear, they call and beg 
 
 That we should choose their door; 
 
 Then other doors are closed, 
 
 And we are welcome there no more. 
 
 Sister dear, — let's be friends to all; 
 
 You and I are closer true 
 Than any fond sorority can be : — 
 
 You join me and I'll join you! 
 
18 YET 
 
 "Well, it's gunpowder for those little pretties!" he re- 
 marked as he folded it for his pocket. But he looked far 
 from sorrowful. 
 
Chapter V 
 
 The telephone rang sharply in the small third floor 
 room of the Fenton Hosiery Mills, which had been as- 
 signed to John Smokas as his personnel office. The 'phone 
 sounded as though an important person was waiting, and 
 John answered its summons promptly. 
 
 "Is it you, John? Will you have dinner with me tonight 
 at the Illinois hotel? Suppose you meet me in the lobby. No, 
 nothing especial to discuss. Just good eats and good fellow- 
 ship." John Smokas smiled to himself as he laid the telephone 
 back in its cradle. Such summons had become about twice- 
 a-week invitations. But a good dollar and a half dinner is 
 not to be scorned, and Smokas really liked Peter Fenton. 
 He thought, grinning, 
 
 "He couldn't be prouder of that 'J onn ' if ne na d been 
 a bishop and had christened me." Smokas himself looked 
 around his compact little office with a good deal of pride. 
 Business like files filled two sides of the room; his own 
 private library, in simple cases, took the spaces between 
 doors and windows on the other sides. 
 
 "Believe I'll tell him tonight," he decided, "that I can 
 wind up the work here by spring. I don't mean the work 
 will not go on, but I shall have things so well systematized 
 that unless something unforeseen happens — Old Mill burn 
 down, or something like that — the trained nurse for the 
 factory will have time and ability to keep the files in shape, 
 choose the recreational committees, and watch the mental 
 atmosphere of the mills. — Jimminy, I hate to leave! But 
 in another year I'd vegetate." 
 
 Closing his self-appointed office hours at 5 :30, John 
 Smokas crossed the Sangamon on Mill bridge, and walked 
 
 19 
 
20 YET 
 
 briskly along Main street, past the county courthouse, to 
 the hotel. 
 
 For a number of years now the Illinois hotel manage- 
 ment in Fentonia had considered the round table for eight 
 in the north-east corner of the hotel dining room, looking 
 toward the river, as Peter Fenton's table. There was nothing 
 formal about this assignment. Any guests might be seated 
 there at breakfast or luncheon, or if Mr. Fenton was known 
 to be out of the city, at dinner. But when he was at home 
 he never needed to reserve it; it was his, whether he was 
 by himself or with a group of guests. 
 
 "You may wonder," he said once to Smokas, "why with 
 the staff of help I keep at the mansion, and the prettiest 
 dining room in the state, yet I choose to eat my dinners 
 down town. Well, there are a bunch of reasons. It is de- 
 moralizing to any group of home help not to know until 
 the last moment whether one or eight are going to dine. 
 
 "Then, too, John, — I tell you I like good food! Illinois, 
 I have always maintained, has the best food, in all types 
 and varieties, to be found in the United States. But it has 
 to be handled right, — I'll say it does! And I don't pretend 
 to keep a professional chef, at home." 
 
 "This is one of the innings for you, of being a bachelor," 
 John Smokas grinned. "If there were a missus, you wouldn't 
 want to make her trot down town every day, and she 
 wouldn't want hubby to be minus at dinner time." Peter 
 Fenton's eyes narrowed at that. For a moment Smokas felt 
 perhaps he had overstepped proper bounds. Finally Fenton 
 said slowly, 
 
 "There would be compensations." He paused again. 
 Then a smile lighted his face, and he added, 
 
 "John Smokas, when I marry, my wife will be so devoted 
 and so executive that having eight unexpected guests at 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 21 
 
 dinner will be a feather-weight job to her!" Both men 
 laughed. 
 
 On the evening in question, Fenton met Smokas with a 
 cordial hand-clasp, in the lobby, and they went in at once 
 to dinner. Being very much a man who believes if things 
 are to be done, the better it is to get at it, when the empty 
 plates from the fine "Philadelphia pepper-pot" soup were 
 carried away, and before the steak and mushrooms had ar- 
 rived, John Smokas brought forward his plan for giving 
 up the personnel work at the end of the year. 
 
 Peter Fenton pondered much longer than on the 
 previous occasion when the effect of matrimony on his din- 
 ner habits had come up. Finally, he nodded, slowly, 
 
 "I see your point. The year is doing us all good. I 
 would not have believed that so many small friction-points 
 could have been rubbed smooth as you have accomplished. 
 — For yourself, John, — hasn't it taken some of the 'parlor 
 pink' out of you?" Smokas flushed a bit, then he laughed 
 so heartily that other diners turned and smiled, 
 
 ' 'Pink' is good — though I would have supposed last 
 year it was a good honest 'red' — pretty sure President Har- 
 ney thought so. But there is nothing like getting together ; 
 mill-owners, operatives — especially the children and young 
 folks — to make the family feeling. That's the remedy — 
 getting together, not sitting off in two camps, glaring at one 
 another." 
 
 "Good enough, John! — But now getting back to the 
 question of what is going to happen to you and me. — I 
 should miss you like the Dickens, if you left Fentonia. — 
 Don't want to edit the Times, do you? And have fun, 
 fighting Telucha?" John Smokas reluctantly shook his head, 
 
 "Sorry, sir, — but there isn't any editor-stuff in me. — 
 After dinner, let's go ask Roxie for her opinion!" 
 
Chapter VI 
 
 By four o'clock the next afternoon the same group of 
 young men was present in the office of the Daily Tocsin 
 who had recently greeted the famous Fenton twins there; 
 Smokas, Searles, the Rev. Mr. Brooks and Telucha. Smokas, 
 with a look of inner excitement, had been pacing the floor 
 with Napoleonic folded arms for fifteen minutes, while 
 Telucha finished the last of the day's office tasks. 
 
 Finally he leaned back in his chair, and shouted, 
 
 "Whoa, Smokas! What's drivin' ye? What ye got in 
 your system?" 
 
 "A lot," Smokas answered solemnly; coming to a halt 
 and sitting down to lean over the desk. With the eyes of 
 the other three rather quizzically watching him, he went on, 
 
 "This country has forty-eight states. By the census this 
 is practically the center of the country's population. You 
 Illinois boys would all maintain that its the greatest and 
 grandest state in the Union. But it takes me, ME, a New 
 Yorker, to have to come out here and tell you that you've 
 got Presidential timber right here in this very city. And 
 it's high, sky-high time you did something about it. 
 
 "There, Mr. Editor! Smoke that in your pipe!" Smokas, 
 almost literally out of breath, for he had put all his force 
 into that declaration, glared around the half-circle of 
 astonished men. 
 
 "You mean Peter Fenton, of course; your new idol," 
 Cleon Telucha stated. Enthusiasm is seldom instantane- 
 ously contagious. But Smokas was not yet ready to make 
 his declaration. He went on: 
 
 "There have been thirty-one different men to hold the 
 presidency. Old Virginia has hogged eight; Washington, 
 Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, William Henry Harrison, 
 
 22 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 23 
 
 Tyler, Taylor and Woodrow Wilson. Ohio crawls up too, 
 with seven: Grant, Hayes, Garfield, Benjamin Harrison, 
 McKinley, Taft and Harding. New York gets four: Van 
 Buren, Fillmore and the two Roosevelts; North Carolina, 
 three : Jackson, Polk and Johnson ; Massachusetts, with the 
 two Adams, and Vermont, with Arthur and Coolidge, 
 are about equal. New Jersey, Cleveland ; Pennsylvania, 
 Buchanan; New Hampshire, Pierce; Kentucky, Abraham 
 Lincoln — no, you can't have him, as a born son — and Iowa, 
 with Hoover. 
 
 "Now, where is Illinois, I say? If she's in the soup, 
 there's no reason in God's world that she should stay in 
 the soup!" 
 
 "Bravo!" shouted the young clergyman, "Bring on your 
 candidate!" Instantly John Smokas changed to an ordinary 
 conversational tone, 
 
 "Last night about nine o'clock I was out all by myself 
 at the Park to have a visit with Roxie. D'you know that 
 elephant knows more than most of this city, put together? 
 Peter Fenton had planned to go out with me, but a bunch 
 of oil men came up from the southern part of the state, 
 and he had to have a conference with them. 
 
 "I suppose I was out at the park for an hour, more or 
 less. Roxie seemed much more restless than usual ; tramping 
 up and down same as I was doing here, this afternoon. I 
 called out, 
 
 " 'What's the matter, Old Girl? Do you miss Peter?' 
 And believe it or not, she stopped in her tracks, and waved 
 her trunk up and down. Then she and I just had a sort 
 of confidential talk about Peter Fenton. I'd say nice things 
 about him, and she'd agree. Once she came over to the 
 fence and stroked my hand with the end of her trunk." 
 
 "What's that you said, Searles? 'Wanted more bread?' 
 
24 YET 
 
 Well, indeed she didn't. She knows I don't fool her and 
 keep any back. Why, if I should try that on her once, I'd 
 know her confidence in me was gone forever. Don't you 
 know, man, — didn't you learn it with your A B C's, that 
 elephants don't forget?" 
 
 "See here, you're het up," Cleon Telucha remarked 
 calmly. "Get down to brass tacks. Did you see Fenton 
 after the oil men were gone — by the way, why didn't you 
 tell me they were here? Heluva reporter you'd make!" 
 
 "Of course I didn't see Fenton again! I'm telling you 
 this is Roxie! I verily believe she felt last night she was 
 the whole spirit of the party. 
 
 "I said to her, 'How'd you like to call him "Governor 
 Fenton?"' She sort of stopped and swayed from side to 
 side, but I could see she was not tickled to pieces. I tried, 
 'How about Senator Fenton?' But she wouldn't even look 
 at me. 
 
 "Then, — and honestly, I didn't put on any special stress 
 of tone, or put in any fireworks, but I said, 
 
 ' 'Roxie, how about President Fenton?' — and let me tell 
 you the old girl rose right up on her hind legs — I don't 
 believe there's a soul in this town knows she's ever been 
 trained to — and if she didn't stand there, front legs waving, 
 and try to sing the Star Spangled Banner, you can hand it 
 to me. I want to tell you right now: Peter Fenton was 
 nominated for President of the United States, there in the 
 park last night! — Now I've said my say. The rest of you 
 talk." 
 
 And talk they did; hours and hours. Dinner was for- 
 gotten, though finally they sent out for sandwiches and 
 beer. The Tocsin office, usually dark and silent at night, 
 glared with light, as the men talked the matter through, 
 from many an angle. 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 25 
 
 They talked so late, and then went to sleep so heavily 
 that none of the four roused promptly when fire calls 
 began to shriek on the north side of Fentonia, and fire ap- 
 paratus began to roar through the streets. There were three 
 calls. It was a general alarm. 
 
Chapter VII 
 
 Peter Fenton roused from a queer, half-nightmare 
 dream, in which he had seemed to be driving Roxie, the 
 elephant, hitched to a small cart. In a moment he realized 
 that he had been violently awakened, and had not slipped 
 out of dreamland on his own accord. 
 
 Several sorts of noises assailed his ears; still more or 
 less away in elephant-land. He began to assort them; north 
 Fentonia fire-engine house alarms, sirens on equipment mak- 
 ing hurried runs, and finally, most imperative of all to him, 
 the telephone bell from his bedside table. 
 
 "Fenton speaking," he said to the mouthpiece. The 
 voice of John Smokas, slightly husky and more than a little 
 excited, came over the wire, 
 
 "I'm sorry if I waked you, Mr. Fenton, but there is a 
 bad fire at the college, and I felt sure you would want to be 
 on hand." 
 
 "What building, John?" 
 
 "Old Lincoln hall, the men's dormitory for freshmen. 
 Built right after the Civil war, wasn't it? Ratty old fire- 
 trap!" 
 
 "Is there trouble getting the boys out? What time is it? 
 There are state-law fire escapes on Lincoln hall. Three 
 o'clock? Seemed to me I had not been asleep a half hour. — 
 I'll get there in ten or fifteen minutes." 
 
 Peter Fenton pushed the button to ring the bell for 
 his chauffeur, and while he was hurriedly buttoning his 
 vest, the man called through the door, 
 
 "I'll have the car out front in three minutes, Mist' 
 Fenton." "O.K., Willy!" Peter called in answer. 
 
 "What's burnin', sir? One o' the tall fellers — you can 
 tell by the high look of the fire." 
 
 26 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 27 
 
 "Old Lincoln hall," said Peter, shortly. He was trying 
 to visualize just how those escapes came down. The college 
 was prospering amazingly this year, and Lincoln was packed 
 to the gunwales, so to speak. Like his past life before a 
 drowning man, every sentence that Peter Fenton had used 
 in past board session, in a gallant fight to hang on to the 
 old building, seemed to sound in his ears: "Let the boys 
 have some tradition and history, — good for 'em! If England 
 can have Rugby and Oxford, at least let us have one build- 
 ing that will make the century. We ought to learn from 
 eastern schools, where an old building is prized more than 
 gold." 
 
 This sounded fine in board meeting, but he remembered 
 how persistently McQuard, over in the corner, had growled 
 over and again, "Firetrap, I tell ye; firetrap!" Well, dis- 
 cussion time was over. Fenton could tell from the glowing 
 bricks that every one of the four stories was doomed. 
 
 Willy, ignoring all speed limits, swung the big car 
 along Main street, to the Park bridge, where the traffic was 
 not so heavy. All the county, in this flat land, could see 
 the blaze and was driving in to the fire. A state trooper 
 in the middle of College avenue held up his hand in warn- 
 ing, and Willy stopped the car. 
 
 "Park in a side road, or on a lawn," ordered the officer. 
 "Got to keep College avenue clear for ambulances. Other 
 cities are sending 'em." 
 
 The word ambulance thrust a spear point into Peter 
 Fenton that sent him scrambling out of the car, and down 
 College avenue on the run, leaving Willy to see to the 
 weal of the car. Edging through the crowd, to the ropes 
 of the fire-lines, Peter looked around for John Smokas. 
 He had learned in the last few months that the gist of any 
 situation would be in that man's mind. 
 
28 YET 
 
 In a few moments they saw one another, but to Peter's 
 surprise, Smokas did not come over to him immediately. 
 Of course the crowd was great. It was uncannily silent, 
 also. Roar of water streams, and the hiss when water hits 
 fire, with crashes of falling timbers within the dormitory 
 made the background for the sharp orders of the fire chief. 
 
 Peter looked around in bewilderment. Did everybody 
 but himself know all about the fire? How it started? How 
 long it had been burning? — Most gaspingly important of 
 all, — Were the boys all out? Peter wanted to scream out 
 these questions, but the heavy silence of the onlookers 
 checked his voice. 
 
 Well, if John Smokas would not come to him, he would 
 go to John. It was difficult. No one along the rope wished 
 to yield an inch of his place. Finally the distracted man 
 was reduced to saying, 
 
 "Make way for Peter Fenton. It is imperative that I 
 get to the front of the building." That did it. What must 
 be done, is done. But even John the talkative had gone 
 silent. When Peter reached his side, Smokas shook his 
 head gravely, and motioned to his other side. Then Fenton 
 reali2ed that beside the man was a woman, whom he was 
 supporting with his arm. She in turn clutched close to her 
 a child who was giving low sobs. 
 
 Peter Fenton had the sensation that all his blood was 
 turning to ice water. He was cold, — simply chilled with 
 apprehension. 
 
 "Is it Mrs. Harney, the President's wife?" John nodded, 
 then he said low in a voice wholly unlike his own, 
 
 "There were six boys sleeping in the attic on the fifth 
 floor. They must have been stupified by smoke. The firemen 
 finally got through the tile roof and the boys are all safely 
 out, though it was a close call for them." He paused, but 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 29 
 
 his face did not lighten in the least. Peter could not 
 understand it. He stared questioningly at John Smokas in 
 the murky light. The man half turned, and almost placed 
 his mouth to Fenton's ear, 
 
 "President Harney had been wonderful from the first. 
 He was on the ground early, directing the rescue, and keep- 
 ing the freshmen from panic. But there was some mis- 
 understanding about the men in the attic. The fire escapes 
 were for four floors only, and men were not supposed to 
 be put up there." In the long pause Smokas made Fenton 
 heard his own voice saying to the board, "Most modern 
 and efficient fire escapes have been installed." Mockery of 
 mockeries ! What boy, wanting to stay with other boys, looks 
 for a fire escape? 
 
 "When he realized they were up there," Smokas went 
 on, in that lowest voice, of which nevertheless, the woman 
 at his left heard every syllable," President Harney seemed 
 beside himself. He stared at the stairways, and firemen 
 clutched him then for fear he would leap into the flames. 
 Then he ran away entirely out of sight. 
 
 "The next we knew a scrawled note was handed to the 
 fire-chief, 'I have a soaked double blanket around me, even 
 over my face. Tell my wife I'm all right. I know the old 
 private stair-well, that goes from basement to attic, 
 which boys have been forbidden — so steep. I'll get 'em 
 down. The basement door is free of smoke. Harney' " 
 
 John Smokas said the words as if he never would forget 
 them. Probably he never did. Peter Fenton stood paralyzed, 
 
 "Go on," he ordered. 
 
 "There is no more to tell. It was a dead end. Just a 
 fortnight ago some fool ordered the attic entrance to those 
 steep stairs to be nailed up, when a boy nearly broke his 
 leg coming down. Those hero-firemen on the roof will 
 
30 YET 
 
 stave in the attic door — that's what ails everybody — they're 
 waiting. I've begged Mrs. Harney to go, but she will not 
 leave. You try." 
 
 But just as Fenton made his way behind Smokas to try 
 to help the despairing woman, a great cry rose, 
 
 "They're coming down! They're carrying something!" 
 
 It was indeed an inanimate form the firemen brought. 
 When the attic stairway door gave way, President Harney 
 was found close to it, but the suffocating fumes and gases 
 had done their deadly work. It seemed as though the brave 
 old building, with some of the spirit of the man for whom 
 it was named, had held its frame together till the last fire- 
 man, and the man who had vainly given his life for others, 
 were away from the fire-swept shell. 
 
 "Get back, Get back!" shouted the chief through his 
 speaking trumpet. "She's going to fall — to FALL!" There 
 was a wild surge of the crowd. Peter Fenton picked up Mrs. 
 Harney like a child, and John Smokas followed him with 
 the little Alice. 
 
 Willy, the Fenton chauffeur, had probably kept one eye 
 on Lincoln hall and the other on Peter Fenton for the last 
 half hour. Now he was right at hand, 
 
 "Mist' Fenton, I done sneaked the car up mighty close. 
 They've filled dat President's house plumb full o' boys — 
 in every bed, all ovah de floors. Let's bring the ladies home 
 an' let Sarah wok ober dem. Aint ye the President o' the 
 trustees? Seems to me yo' oughta look after 'em." Fenton 
 looked at Smokas who nodded emphatically. Mrs. Harney 
 seemed to have fainted. Alice had the stony stare of shock. 
 
 "Try and get hold of Doctor Stevenson, on the way," 
 was all Peter Fenton said, as led by Willy, the pitiful 
 cavalcade started. 
 
Chapter VIII 
 
 Sarah Wiggin, housekeeper at the Fenton mansion, had 
 been a fixture there since Peter's grandmother's time. Mar- 
 ried twice in her youth, and being both a "real" and "grass" 
 widow, she had little use for men in general. This did not 
 prevent a great loyalty to the Fenton family, and Peter's 
 word was law to her. 
 
 So when she opened the front door and let in Peter, 
 carrying the unconscious Mrs. Harney; John Smokas with 
 a sobbing child in his arms, and the family doctor following, 
 it was all that Peter needed to say : 
 
 "Have Mrs. Harney placed in mother's bedroom, and 
 the child across the hall, in the pink bedroom, Sarah. Dr. 
 Stevenson will tell you what to do, and I know you'll do it." 
 Then the responsibility of the women-folk was eased from 
 Peter Fenton's shoulders. 
 
 He had plenty of care left, however. With John Smokas, 
 he drove back at once to the office of the Fenton Times. 
 This was a story that the press services would put on the 
 front page of every newspaper in the country, and both 
 men knew it should be given tremendous care. President 
 Harney must not have one gleam of the light of his 
 heroism taken from him. But, on the other hand, the col- 
 lege must not be put in the wrong. Exactly who had given 
 permission for the boys to sleep in the attic was doubtful. 
 Both the dean and assistant dean denied having done it. 
 No one admitted having ordered the attic stair-well door 
 nailed shut. This first publicity, all that thousands would 
 read, should emphasize President Harney's bravery, be- 
 fitting his World war record ; the heroism and skill of Fen- 
 tonia's fire-fighters, and the triumph that not a student life 
 was lost. 
 
 31 
 
32 YET 
 
 Expanded for the local morning paper; able and con- 
 densed for the world in general, the account was really as 
 much a masterpiece in its way as the Gettysburg address. 
 Peter Fenton and John Smokas had worked side by side, 
 on the story. It was remarkable, in a time of stress like 
 this, how the thought and words of one seemed to sup- 
 plement and vivify the work of the other. Sometimes 
 Peter led; sometimes John. In the doleful dawn of a rainy 
 morning, both men were weary almost to exhaustion. 
 
 "I'm going to take you back to the mansion, John," 
 Peter Fenton said. "Willy or Sarah or whoever is in the 
 kitchen will give us coffee, and whatever we want to eat. 
 Then you shall take a pair of my pajamas, and we'll have 
 solid sleep till nine or so. It'll make new men of us." 
 
 "Sure your pajamas will fit?" slender John demanded, 
 looking at the large, finely formed Peter with the first grin 
 since the day before. In a second he sobered, 
 
 "Will that be early enough for us to tackle all the heavy 
 care that is going to fall on Mrs. Harney?" Peter looked 
 thoughtful, 
 
 "I rather think so. We'll get a report about her from 
 Sarah, but I reckon Dr. Stevenson will want her kept quiet 
 until about noon. At any rate, you and I will think all the 
 clearer for a little rest." A smile, which John Smokas 
 watched with some curiosity, grew and deepened on Peter 
 Fenton's face. But all he said at the time was, 
 
 "Don't worry, she will not be neglected." 
 
 Like the model modern business men both were, Fenton 
 and Smokas were showered, shaved, correctly clad and 
 breakfasted, when they met on the stroke of nine in Peter's 
 office-library in the mansion. Copies of the Fentonia Times, 
 as well as Chicago and St. Louis papers were on the desk, 
 and these were the quick goal of the men. Neither praised 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 33 
 
 the other, when the publicity was read, but both men felt 
 comfortably contented. 
 
 The men were scarcely seated when there was a hesitat- 
 ing rap on the door. 
 
 "Come in," Peter Fenton called, and then both men 
 sprang to their feet when Mrs. Harney entered; a pitiful 
 little smile on her pale face. 
 
 "Oh, ought you to be here? — Didn't Dr. Stevenson tell 
 you to stay in bed? — Have you had any breakfast?" Peter 
 demanded impetuously. The woman's little smile deepened, 
 as she seemed to consider which question to answer first. 
 Fenton hurried around to drag forward the easiest chair, 
 and Smokas brought a pillow, which Mrs. Harney waved 
 away, 
 
 "It seemed to me I should be up to help with the ar- 
 rangements. Sarah has taken care of me like a baby, and 
 brought me a good breakfast." John noticed that she did 
 not say how much was eaten. 
 
 With infinite gentleness Peter Fenton asked the questions 
 which confirmed the feeling he had had; that the mother 
 and little daughter were singularly alone in the world. No, 
 she did not wish President Harney's body taken east. She 
 felt it should lie here, near the place of his sacrifice. Yes, 
 if Mr. Fenton would arrange services in the college chapel, 
 it would seem fitting. Yes, she felt she should remain in 
 Fentonia, because Alice was doing so well in her school — 
 but not in the President's residence, — Oh, no! — Oh, no! — 
 her voice broke for the first time. She couldn't go back 
 there! 
 
 Peter Fenton laid a firm hand on her twisting fingers, 
 
 "Mrs. Harney, you look after little Alice, and help get 
 her back to normalcy, and everything else — yes, I mean 
 EVERYTHING— John Smokas and I will see to. 
 
34 YET 
 
 "Do you believe me, Alice? Will you trust me?" She 
 looked up startled, 
 
 "How did you know my name?" Then it was his turn 
 to be startled. He had not realized what he had called her. 
 He flushed a little, but answered steadily, 
 
 "I was told the little girl was named for her mother. 
 It will be best for the two of you to stay here until after 
 the funeral. Then something shall be arranged. But not 
 the President's residence; I promise that." She rose, in the 
 same slow quiet way in which she had entered, 
 
 "Your kind Sarah has promised to go over to that house 
 for me, and pack bags of our things. — You are quite sure 
 we will not be a bother here?" Her blue eyes looked earn- 
 estly at him. He smiled at her in a heartening way, 
 
 "There are twenty-two rooms in the mansion. When 
 the other twenty are all full, then I shall decide at once 
 that you and little Alice are bothers. Not before that." 
 
 She started to go, but Peter Fenton hastened after her. 
 He had a feeling that morning that he could not bear to 
 let her out of his sight. He held out his hand again, 
 
 "If the smallest thing comes to your mind that you 
 would like to suggest, you will send for me, or come down, 
 will you not? I speak for John, here, too. We both want 
 to help." She divided a little smile between them, but 
 shook her head, and said, 
 
 "You know better than I what to suggest." After she 
 closed the door Peter said, 
 
 "She had put a bit of mother's perfume on her fore- 
 head." 
 
Chapter IX 
 
 It was now Saturday morning, following the fire of 
 early Tuesday. The funeral, dignified and ceremonious, 
 carried out with an elegance which William H. Harney 
 himself, in his modesty, would never have expected, took 
 place Thursday. The telegram from the President of the 
 United States was read, in which he extended sympathy to 
 the bereaved family and to the college faculty and students, 
 but bade them remember their undying heritage in the 
 memory of President Harney's heroic death. Already plans 
 were under way for a stately monument to him, while the 
 trustees, in special session, voted to name the new dormi- 
 tory, which would immediately go into construction, Harney 
 Hall. 
 
 Like every undertaking directed by Peter Fenton, there 
 was system and competence in every direction. Friday, also, 
 had been an important day in the lives of Mrs. Harney and 
 little Alice. For one thing, their local habitat had been 
 arranged, and for another, Mrs. Harney was appointed to 
 an appropriate post. In a way that seemed almost prov- 
 idential, the place of dean of girls in Fentonia high school 
 became vacant just at this time; possibly as a temporary 
 vacancy, but more than likely, as a permanent place. 
 
 With Peter Fenton on the school board, it was easy to 
 appoint Mrs. Harney to the post as temporary supply, with 
 work to begin the following Monday, at full salary. Peter 
 believed in work, and he felt certain that nothing would 
 be so good for the bewildered, sorrowing woman as a regu- 
 lar post and a regular paycheck. As president of the college 
 trustees, he made it sure that she would also be allowed the 
 money that would have been paid to President Harney until 
 the end of the college year. So much for the finance side. 
 
 35 
 
36 YET 
 
 The Fenton twins, Iona and Leona, lived with their 
 mother in what was always spoken of as the "Reuben 
 Fenton house," It was a rambling structure, made exceed- 
 ingly comfortable by thorough installations of modern im- 
 provements. About two blocks away was the grade school 
 which little Alice Harney attended. The Fenton twins had 
 been among the most devoted admirers of President Harney 
 in the college. His austere New England spirit, and his 
 imperative sense of duty's obligations had not served to 
 bring him into close relations with many students. But the 
 twins, if they had an ideal, did not wait for it to come to 
 them, but went after it vigorously in the same brave manner 
 in which they had sought for an opening for their poetry 
 in the newspaper office. They had insisted that their mother 
 frequently entertain the president and his family at Sunday 
 dinners, and they had hung upon his words until he con- 
 fessed to his wife that they embarrassed him. 
 
 All of this adequately explains why the Fenton twins 
 were waiting on the mansion doorstep Friday morning 
 when the household came to life. 
 
 "She must come to us, Uncle Peter," Iona said urgently. 
 "There's Alice's school building, right close to us. We've 
 thought it all out, Leona and I. We'll give the east wing 
 right up to her. There's a pretty living room and three bed- 
 rooms. If she doesn't want always to have her meals with us 
 — though we'd love that — the little sun-room will make a 
 darling dining room, — O Uncle, do urge her to come!" 
 
 Peter Fenton patted the red cheek of the excited girl, 
 
 "I imagine it won't take much urging. It's really a fine 
 and hospitable thing for your mother and you girls to do. 
 But remember, let her pay rent." 
 
 "Oh, NO, Uncle Peter! Rent? That's terrible! She's a 
 guest." 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 37 
 
 Peter Fenton shook his head emphatically, 
 
 " 'Guest' is all right for a day or a week, or even maybe 
 for a month, though that is straining a point some. For an 
 indefinite stay, perhaps of years, there should be a definite 
 financial arrangement." Before his superior masculine rea- 
 soning, the twins were quelled, but Leona said pleadingly, 
 
 "We needn't speak of money to her this morning, need 
 we?" Peter laughed, and said, 
 
 "You're a wheedler. But I'd be willing to bet that Mrs. 
 Harney will speak of it herself." And so she certainly did. 
 Presently she joined the little group in the entrance hall 
 of the mansion, and the twins put their eager plea. Light 
 and color came to Mrs. Harney's face, 
 
 "You girls and your mother have already made your 
 house seem like a hospitable home to us. President Harney 
 remarked many times on your unusual and great kindness 
 to us. But will it not incommode your mother to rent a 
 part of her home?" Peter rolled a wickedly twinkling eye 
 at the twins, but they deliberately refused to look at him, 
 
 "Mother wants you, badly!" they said in chorus, and 
 Iona explained that her mother would have accompanied 
 them, except that she had twisted an ankle that morning, 
 and must keep quiet for a few days. 
 
 "Come tomorrow, Mrs. Harney," they urged, "and be all 
 settled and ready to rest on Sunday." Mrs. Harney looked 
 up questioningly to Peter Fenton, 
 
 "You have been most kind, Mr. Fenton, and I don't 
 wish to seem to rush away. But it would be good to be 
 established, for Alice's school routine Monday." Peter said 
 simply, 
 
 "Mrs. Harney, this house is at the disposal of you and 
 Alice whenever you want it. But I can see that the girls 
 seem to have a wise plan. Go back and forth today in my 
 
38 YET 
 
 car as many times as you want to. Willy is happy to be 
 your chauffeur. Come back here for tonight, and then, as 
 Iona suggests, finally settle in at their home tomorrow." 
 
 So it was settled, to the great delight of the twins. The 
 idea of helping to arrange a new home, at the friendly 
 Reuben Fenton house which she already knew well, seemed 
 to do little Alice a world of good. From a droopy child, 
 whose lip quivered if anyone spoke to her suddenly, she 
 began again to have springs in her feet and little laughs 
 upon her lips. 
 
 Saturday morning she came into her mother's bedroom 
 in her pajamas, and scrambled up on the side of her 
 mother's bed, 
 
 "Mother, I don't want you to leave this place till I get 
 a chance to show you the elephant-room. It's the wonder- 
 fulest place! I don't believe there's any fairyland that's 
 nicer." 
 
 "Who showed it to you, dear?" 
 
 "Mr. Fenton, — last night after dinner, when the high 
 school principal was here to see you. It's a big long room, 
 with lots of elephant pictures on the walls, and elephant 
 lamps to light it — and books, books, books, full of elephant 
 stories, — Oh, mother, — I could just live a year in that room, 
 and not leave it! Will he let us come again? — I guess I 
 hadn't told you; on shelves and in cases there are 3721 
 elephants — unless some more came in the mail this morn- 
 ing! What do you think of that, mother?" 
 
 "Who dusts them, I wonder, "Mrs. Harney said sleepily. 
 It was still more than an hour before breakfast time at 
 the mansion. 
 
 "Oh-h-h!" Alice gave a long sighing breath. 
 
 "Do you suppose he'd let me do it?" 
 
Chapter X 
 
 On Sunday the campaign really opened. 
 
 The four men present at the hatching of the idea of 
 Peter Fenton for President of the United States; John 
 Smokas, Cleon Telucha, Rector Wallace Brooks and Dr. 
 Edwin Searles, college chemist, were augmented by Wilson 
 Green, city editor of the Fentonia Times, and Don Warner, 
 young local lawyer with a keen political sense and much 
 ward experience. 
 
 These six met at noon Sunday in the lobby of the Illinois 
 hotel, after the varied way in which they had spent their 
 morning. Smokas, for instance, had been in the elephant 
 house with Roxie during all the time when Brooks was 
 conducting services! 
 
 But here they were; feeling a good deal of suppressed 
 excitement, and indeed, "rarin' to go." Telucha felt the 
 fire had cost them nearly a valuable week. 
 
 "Fenton will not be here for dinner this noon," Smokas 
 told them. "Iona told me with pride he is to be their 
 dinner guest. The twins said they thought it would not 
 be so solemn for Mrs. Harney if there were a man around ! 
 So let's ask for his table." 
 
 A good many eyes turned to look at the tableful of six 
 young men — eating plentifully, it is true, of the good turkey 
 dinner, but seeming more interested in their low-toned talk 
 to one another than even in the excellent food. 
 
 Brooks and Searles were rather newcomers to Fentonia. 
 Green and Warner had been born in that city, with Wilson 
 Green's home on the south side, and Warner's on the north. 
 Brooks said with curiosity, 
 
 "How does it come that you editors can both swing 
 your papers for the same man? Isn't there any political 
 
 39 
 
40 YET 
 
 fight in the town?" Green, as the older man, answered in 
 his quiet, studied manner, 
 
 "Both papers are ostensibly independent. Of course 
 that's more or less a veneer. Back in the 60's they fought 
 each other tooth and nail. But that time, thank heaven, is 
 gone. For one thing, Peter Fenton is a big man in both 
 corporations. One of us serves the evening field as well as 
 he can, and the other, the morning. It's an uncommonly 
 Garden-of-Eden state of affairs. But as I see it, — it's a simply 
 amazing set-up for kindling a bonfire in honor of a state's 
 favorite son." This statement from the calm Green gave 
 Smokas such a hectic moment that most of the diners in 
 the large room heard him give a low shout, 
 
 "That's the stuff, Green! Keep it up!" 
 
 It was planned that midway in the afternoon the group 
 should go to the Fenton mansion as a formal delegation. 
 If he had not returned home, they would wait for him. 
 That six busy men had done this would impress him at 
 the start. 
 
 "This thing is going to hit Peter Fenton right between 
 the eyes," John Smokas declared. "If I'm right, and I think 
 I am, while people have sometimes joked him about being 
 the President of the United States, I do not think he ever 
 gave the matter serious consideration. He is a genuinely 
 modest man, even if he is tremendously clear-sighted, and 
 ought to know his own worth. He has always been more 
 interested in carrying well whatever responsibilities he has 
 — and they are many — than in looking for more great jobs 
 for himself." 
 
 "And whoever tackles running this country has a plenty 
 big job!" put in Searles. 
 
 "Do you think we should have sent for a few Chicago 
 men to have met with us today?" Green asked, anxiously. 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 41 
 
 But Smokas was definite in his plan, 
 
 "Not today. That's coming. This is the pure home- 
 call to duty, — something like the old New England Town 
 meeting — that is going to make tremendous non-partisan 
 publicity, from Maine to California. Come on, — let's go!" 
 
 So many of the men drove coupes, in connection with 
 their occupations, that quite a cavalcade came up the drive- 
 way of the mansion, and swung around to the side parking- 
 space. Willy met the delegation with ceremony, at the 
 front door, 
 
 "Come in, gemman, come in! Mist' Fenton ain't at 
 home jes' now, but I look fo' him any minute — in fac', I 
 b'lieve I'll go for him! Come right in the lib'ry — smokes 
 of all sorts on de desk — dere now, I hear de 'phone! Sho 
 dat's him, wantin' me to come fo' him. Jes y'all have 
 patience!" 
 
 Little patience was needed. Thanks to Willy's energy, 
 and Peter Fenton's own wonder what "quite a crowd o' 
 gemmans" might want on a quiet Sunday afternoon, he 
 entered the library at the mansion within ten minutes. To 
 his surprise, the six men in the room promptly rose to 
 greet him, when he opened the door. He smiled a little, 
 
 "Why all of this ceremony? Be seated and be com- 
 fortable. What can I do for you?" He himself went over 
 to his own desk, where he was accustomed to sit when 
 directing various affairs. Green had been asked to be 
 spokesman, and now came over by the desk, 
 
 "Mr. Fenton, you would not wish us to beat around 
 the bush. We feel that a great honor is ours today, in 
 speaking as we feel we do, for this city, for Illinois and 
 for the nation, to ask that you will allow your name to be 
 used in candidacy for the post of President of the United 
 States." 
 
42 YET 
 
 The room was still with a strange stillness. It seemed 
 as though the six younger men fairly held their breath. 
 Peter Fenton, as he sat quietly in his familiar desk chair, 
 became noticeably pale, showing that the proposal had 
 come to him with the effect of a shock. In just a moment, 
 however, he rallied, and his familiar smile came to his lips, 
 
 "Boys, I had no least intimation of what you wanted. 
 — Perhaps it is disrespectful to address you so, but I'm still 
 a little off balance, and many of you have seemed like my 
 sons to me. 
 
 "This is not a matter for a snap decision," — John Smokas 
 made an impatient gesture, and murmured, 
 
 "We lost nearly a week, on account of the fire, — time 
 isn't money in this case, — it's votes." Peter nodded, 
 
 "I see your point, Smokas, and I want to be reasonable. 
 Running for President in these days is almost like offering 
 your head and heart to the nation — especially the oppo- 
 sition press, for footballs. Do I want to do it?" Don 
 Warner, the politician, rushed into this breach, 
 
 "Do it for Illinois, and the people, Mr. Fenton; that's 
 what we urge. Illinois has never had a really born president, 
 much as we have tried to claim Lincoln. But we feel that 
 you, with the interests you have had, from Texas to Cali- 
 fornia, and your years of study, as a young man, in the 
 east, have given you a national understanding such as is 
 immensely needed in a President. — We haven't gone into 
 this thing hastily, sir. We studied over it — and I'll war- 
 rant the Reverend Brooks has prayed over it. This is just 
 as true and earnest a call as if there were a throng here 
 reaching away down to the Sangamon." 
 
 "The Sangamon?" Peter Fenton said slowly, "Lincoln's 
 river. Well, I was born near it, swam in it, drank it — 
 filtered, thank Heaven ! — and been baptized with it. Maybe 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 43 
 
 a little of the Lincoln virtue has soaked into me." At this 
 pause he did not merely smile, he really chuckled, 
 
 "There's one thing about it, boys. For some years when 
 I have seen a concern managed in a way that didn't seem 
 best to me, I have itched to help control it — and times 
 enough to surprise you if you knew the number, a few 
 investments have enabled me to do that very thing. It's 
 a private pride of mine, how many concerns I have helped 
 to keep going, in the troublous years we've had. 
 
 "I admit I've had a few ideas about the government, 
 — and like thousands of others, about how to balance the 
 budget. So if you boys want to try the rather dubious 
 project of bringing out a dark horse, — well, go ahead, and 
 God bless you!" 
 
 " 'Dark horse' nothing!" shouted John Smokas at the 
 top of his voice. "If electricity and printers' ink can do 
 it — and who's seen anything yet they couldn't do? — you're 
 going to be the brightest horse in the Presidential race. — 
 It won't break the Sabbath to do a little yelling! Three 
 cheers and nine rahs for PETER FENTON, next President 
 of U.S.A.!" 
 
Chapter XI 
 
 It was still a little early to use a porch swing, but at the 
 Reuben Fenton home there was one sheltered angle between 
 the main house and a wing where a porch swing stayed all 
 winter on a semi-enclosed porch. Here one afternoon John 
 Smokas and little Alice Harney were spending a pleasant 
 hour swinging, after her school was dismissed for the day. 
 Since the night of the fire the two had been great pals. 
 The child never seemed to forget the time when even her 
 mother had fainted and gone beyond her reach, but John 
 Smokas had been something firm for her to clutch. 
 
 "I'm going to tell you a true story, Alice girl," John 
 said in his mellow, pleasant voice. 
 
 "Oh, I like that! Make it a long one." 
 
 "Well, we'll see how it works out. In true stories you 
 know you have to stop when they are done. But at any 
 rate, I'll tell you every single sentence that I know about the 
 story. 
 
 "Once upon a time — " Alice snuggled closer to him. 
 
 "Oh, I just love stories that begin 'Once upon a time'!" 
 
 "Me too, Alice. Well, as I said, once upon a time there 
 was a little bitty woolly elephant born over in India. It was 
 1812, and there was a war, so it wasn't very healthy to go 
 to sea." 
 
 "Why was the elephant woolly, Dr. Smokas?" 
 
 "Well, all new-born elephants are sort of fuzzy. They 
 smooth out before long. She was quite a young lady when 
 she did cross the ocean in 1836, but she stayed alive to be 
 quite an old lady, for she lived till 1932, and then you see 
 she was 120 years old. Her name was 'Tillie,' and in all 
 that long time here she belonged to the Robinson shows." 
 
 "How old do you suppose our Roxie is?" 
 
 44 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 45 
 
 "Mr. Fenton thinks she is about forty, — at any rate, I 
 believe that is in the bill of sale her owners gave him." 
 
 "Nice Roxie," murmured Alice. 
 
 "But now going back to Tillie. I want you to picture 
 just as nice an elephant as there ever was; in all her 120 
 years she never injured a soul; she was a real old trouper, 
 when circuses were smaller, and they claim she tramped 
 from the Atlantic to the Pacific coast, and most of the way 
 back. 
 
 "In her later years she spent the off-season months at 
 John Robinson's home, in Cincinnati, Ohio — and here's the 
 point of this story, Alice : 
 
 "John Robinson taught that elephant to say 'PAPA'! 
 
 "Now what do you think of that?" Alice sat up very 
 straight and stiff, and reacted to the story precisely the way 
 John Smokas wanted her to do. 
 
 "I think that Tillie was pretty smart, — but I don't be- 
 lieve she was a single bit smarter than our Roxie is, — so 
 there now! — Let's you and I go to work and see if we can't 
 make Roxie talk. If one could, other smart elephants can." 
 
 "It would have to be rather a short word, with clear 
 sounds," Smokas said slowly, then added artfully, 
 
 "Don't you believe it would please Mr. Fenton a lot 
 if she learned to shout 'PETER!' ' Alice simply jumped 
 up and down in her delight, 
 
 "Oh, can't we teach her, you and I? I'd stand and shout 
 'Peter' to her by the hour, if it would do any good, and the 
 minute she began to make a sound back, we'd give her candy 
 or something, for a reward. — Oh, that's just the grandest 
 fun there ever was!" 
 
 "Go ask your mother if you may ride over to see Roxie. 
 Tell her I'll bring you back in an hour. Then we'll try her 
 out with the first lesson. I have some sugar lumps in my 
 
46 YET 
 
 pocket, for I think she'd better get something sweet every 
 time we give a lesson." 
 
 So away went the funnily assorted couple; each with 
 the same design on the big pachyderm, and each of them 
 willing to shout "Peter!" by the half hour at a time. 
 
 Alice's sole idea was to prove that the beloved Roxie 
 was as smart a beast as any Tillie could have been. But 
 John Smokas had a far-reaching scheme in his mind, that 
 showed there was plenty of boy left in him yet. He had a 
 clear vision of an immense convention hall. He'd have a 
 runway built to the side of the stage, if he had to tear a 
 hole in the building wall, he thought to himself, adding, 
 
 "Won't it knock 'em for a goal, if after a nominating 
 speech is made, Roxie appears and yells, 'Peter! Peter!' 
 Then there'll be no stopping us, — and that will make inter- 
 national news to interest folks from Bombay to Australia." 
 
 John Smokas was now a regular dinner companion of 
 Peter Fenton, at the Illinois hotel. They found the leisurely 
 meal an excellent time to check up on the day's activities 
 and results. But John said not a word that night of the 
 schemes of the two conspirators; himself and little Alice 
 Harney. 
 
 On the Monday after the presidential plan was broached 
 to Peter Fenton he had said to Smokas, at the mansion, 
 
 "You told me the personnel work at the mills is about 
 ready to turn over to Miss Sanborn, the trained nurse. Do 
 that right away, if you can, and then I hope you'll be will- 
 ing to be a sort of private secretary, confidential adviser and 
 general factotum for me, in this big job. I'll pay as many 
 thousands as you were getting hundreds, at the mill." 
 
 John Smokas flushed until he could not have been any 
 redder, and in his unwonted embarrassment he nearly 
 stuttered, 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 47 
 
 "I'm — I'm only too honored to be allowed to stand 
 right by. But you will believe, Mr. Fenton, it's not a matter 
 of money for myself that pricks me on. I'm sold on YOU, 
 and what you can do for the country." Peter Fenton smiled, 
 
 "You and I have already found out that we work to- 
 gether like pretty good team horses. Let me know if I work 
 you too long and hard." 
 
 The elder man stared into a burning soft coal fire in 
 the grate in his library. He seemed so deep in thought that 
 John Smokas kept entirely silent, sure that something was 
 brewing in Fenton's mind. At last Peter ran a searching 
 finger into his vest pocket, and brought out a scrap of 
 newspaper. John wondered what was coming now. Had 
 one of the attacks on "millionaire-capitalists" at last got 
 under his skin? But all that Peter said was, 
 
 "I ran across a little poem today about a grate fire, like 
 this one, and I liked it. Want me to read it?" John nodded. 
 
 "YOUR LUMP: MINE 
 
 Too fine a fire for me alone, 
 
 I'll call you in, I ween; 
 What matter that a thousand miles 
 
 Lie you and me between? 
 
 That big black lump, all fire-streaked, 
 
 I name for you, always ; 
 And mine, the smaller, to the front, 
 
 With hot and heartening blaze. 
 
 Your lump now wears a golden crown, 
 
 Mine flames by itself apart, 
 But what if forgetting the thousand miles, 
 
 I make them one flaming heart? 
 
48 YET 
 
 Were there before two sober lumps, 
 
 Sullen as if with shame ? 
 Together now they consecrate 
 
 The room with an altar-flame." 
 
 There was an odd quality in Peter Fenton's voice as he 
 finished the reading. He seemed almost to have forgotten 
 Smokas' presence. Then he looked up suddenly with one 
 of his brightest smiles, 
 
 "Well, John, — do you believe in love at first sight?" 
 
 It was evidently a rhetorical question; certainly John 
 Smokas did not attempt any answer. Presently, with the 
 work of the day done, he was climbing into his coupe out- 
 side the door. But all the way home, though he managed 
 to watch the traffic lights, his mind was whirling around 
 and around through the mazes of the question, 
 
 "Can the man be planning to run a love affair, as well 
 as run for President?" 
 
Chapter XII 
 
 Another Saturday had come around. It was a mild day 
 for the early spring season, and Mrs. Harney came out on 
 the porch and tried the swing which little Alice seemed to 
 like so well. She was thoroughly glad for a respite from 
 the public school work, which she freely admitted to herself 
 was much harder than "being just a lady," as Alice had 
 put it, when she lamented that her mother's school duties 
 "kept her so much busier than when she was just a lady." 
 
 "The mistress of a home always feels she is worn into 
 the earth with care," meditated Mrs. Harney. "But she 
 doesn't know her blessings till she loses them. — I don't 
 mean, the great blessings, like love and appreciation ; I 
 mean little things, like time to read the morning paper, to 
 write a letter or two — or even to eat an apple in the mid- 
 dle of the morning!" For all such thoughts, however, she 
 was not in a gloomy mood when she saw little Alice, com- 
 ing from a neighbor's playground, with something a bit 
 forlorn in her look. 
 
 "What's the matter, honey-bunch?" Alice's mother called 
 to her, and immediately the child's face lightened, and she 
 began to run, 
 
 "O mother, isn't it grand to have you home, where I 
 can get at you when I want you! Why did they have to 
 have the high school way over in south Fentonia, and make 
 you — what is it? — 'supervise the noon hour'?" 
 
 "That's because you and I didn't have the fixing of 
 things, isn't it, lambie? Let's not worry; we'll work it 
 better after awhile. What was bothering you, dear, as you 
 were coming along?" Alice laughed outright, 
 
 "You won't think it was much of a solemn thing, 
 mother, but I was worrying about Roxie." 
 
 49 
 
50 YET 
 
 "Roxie? The elephant, do you mean? What's the matter 
 with her? Is she sick?" 
 
 "Oh, no mother! It's this way. Dr. Smokas and I have 
 a plan to teach Roxie something, — and now he has to go 
 of! to New York, with no knowing how long he'll be gone. 
 He said goodbye over the 'phone, and told me, 'Now keep 
 Roxie up to time!' — but I'd like to know how to do it." 
 
 "What is it he wants Roxie to do?" 
 
 "Say 'PETER' — just like Tillie said 'Papa'. 
 
 "Who is Tillie?" 
 
 "Now, mother, I see you've got to have the whole story. 
 It was going to be Dr. Smokas' and my secret. But you're 
 a good one to keep secrets." So the long story about the 
 famous elephant who could speak was told again, and very 
 well told, for Alice had drunk in every syllable Smokas told 
 her. Mrs. Harney believed in being just as good a listener 
 for a child as for a rich or learned elder. She didn't inter- 
 rupt and she really gave her mind to the tale. At the close 
 she rose immediately, 
 
 "Let's go in the house and get a little packet of sugar 
 lumps, then we'll take the car and go right over to the park. 
 Roxie's education mustn't be neglected. But, dear, let's ask 
 the advice of Old Jim, Roxie's keeper. He's forgotten a 
 great deal more about elephants than you or I ever knew." 
 She was watching Alice keenly in these days when the child 
 was rallying gallantly from the shock which might so easily 
 have upset her nervous system. The droopy child who had 
 walked along the street was now alive with happiness. 
 
 Old Jim, who had been with Roxie for 25 years, was 
 standing by the gate to the elephant enclosure as they drove 
 up. 
 
 "Mornin', little Missy! You're the girl that likes old 
 Roxie pretty well." 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 51 
 
 "Indeed I do, Mr. Jim. And this is my mother. She 
 likes elephants, too. And we want to ask you something — 
 now, mother, you tell it." Mrs. Harney sat down on one of 
 the many park benches which faced Roxie's strongly fenced 
 exercise enclosure. Old Jim stood respectfully near by. 
 
 "Have you heard of the John Robinson elephant, 
 'Tillie'?" she began. Old Jim threw his head back and 
 laughed, 
 
 "I've slept many a night in the straw alongside of Tillie, 
 ma'am. I used to work for the John Robinson shows. Tillie 
 was one of the grandest elephants that ever stepped on this 
 earth." 
 
 "And you heard her say 'Papa', to Mr. Robinson?" 
 
 "Yes, MA'AM, I'll say I have! Not that she said it all 
 day, nor every day. But specially if anything frightened 
 her, or if John Robinson came back from an absence when 
 she had missed him. I mind one time especially, when the 
 thunder was just boomin' overhead. Elephants don't like 
 thunder and lightning any too well. — My, how the old gal 
 made the tent ring, yellin' 'PAPA' ! till John came and 
 quieted her down." 
 
 "Well, Mr. Jim, Dr. Smokas and little Alice here have 
 heard that story, and they think Roxie is as smart a beast as 
 Tillie could have been. They are both fond of Mr. Fenton, 
 who gave Roxie to the park, and they want to teach her to 
 say 'Peter'. What do you think? Could it be done, and will 
 you help?" The two Alices looked beseechingly at the 
 grizzled old circus man — whose elephant was really his chief 
 pride. They had appealed to a tender spot — his love for 
 showing off Roxie. He scratched his head, meditated, and 
 finally said, 
 
 "Wall, now ma'am, an' little missy, I can't say it ever 
 come to my mind to make Roxie talk. But there's nothin' 
 
 ill u 
 
52 YET 
 
 like tryin'. As you say, Mr. Fenton'd be pleased as Punch, 
 to have her yell 'Peter'! Of course, by good rights, he 
 oughter do the teachin', but that's too much to ask a man 
 that's mebbe goin' to be President o' these United States. 
 
 "Jimminy! AINT that the stuff now? To think Roxie 
 might holler 'hullo', so to speak, to the President himself! 
 She'd git famous right alongside of him, for there aint nary 
 talkin' elephant, with Tillie dead. 
 
 "Say, wouldn't it be grand if she'd yell 'President?' 
 But I dunno. I reckon just short plain 'Peter' is best. One 
 thing sure; when you start, you stick. I've heard John 
 Robinson yell 'Papa' to Tillie by the hour at a time." Mrs. 
 Harney and Alice were squeezing each others' hands in 
 delight. They hadn't dreamed of getting such an enthusi- 
 astic response. 
 
 "See here, ma'am and missy; once I was with Roxie 
 out in California. You know they're great folks out there 
 for them big fat green artichokes — wouldn't give a cent 
 a peck for 'em, for my eatin' — but Roxie! Jimminy, how 
 she'd go for 'em! That's the only time I ever heard her 
 make like a speech sound — an' what d'ge think? She'd 
 sound a lot like shoutin' 'Peet'! I just called it her tickled- 
 noise, an' when I'd bring in a basket o' chokes, she an' I'd 
 yell 'Peet', 'Peet' back an' forth, jes for the fun o' it. — There's 
 artichokes down in the fancy markets now, ma'am. Pretty 
 high priced fodder for elephants, but, Jimminy, it's worth 
 tryin'. She'n I better be all alone, so she'll remember Cali- 
 fornia better, when we try it — but sure, ma'am, I'll call ye 
 on the 'phone — an' little missy — if I get a 'Peet' out o' 
 Roxie!" 
 
Chapter XIII 
 
 While the very mild conspiracy concerning Roxie was 
 progressing in the middle west, far more unpleasant plans 
 concerning Peter Fenton were being made in the east. 
 
 Fenton and Smokas by his side were putting in busy 
 days in New York City. There were men and organizations 
 to meet, there were statements of views and purposes which 
 required much care, and the preliminary arrangements were 
 being made for a trip to the Pacific coast, with occasional 
 speaking engagements along the way. 
 
 The two men had rooms on the same floor of their 
 hotel, but they were not in a suite. As Fenton said, 
 
 "You and I might be like schoolgirls, and be tempted 
 to sit up talking things over when we ought to get needed 
 rest." This rest was not always the easiest to gain. Heavy 
 dinners, complimentary to Fenton as honor guest, must be 
 eaten, and the discussions often called for quick and taxing 
 thinking. On the Friday night before the Saturday of 
 Roxie's artichoke feast, Peter Fenton had found himself 
 absolutely unable to go to sleep. Looking at his watch at 
 intervals, he had just seen that it marked three. 
 
 The faintest of tinkles came from the telephone by 
 his bed. He smiled and thought, "That probably is John. 
 He doesn't mean to wake me, in case I am asleep," then 
 aloud, 
 
 "Fenton speaking." 
 
 "This is Smokas. May I come in for a few minutes? 
 It's rather important." Fenton assured him he could, and 
 got out of bed to unbolt the door and light a few lamps. 
 His taste in colors was bright, so when he opened the door 
 for his friend, the contrast in their attire was a bit startling. 
 Smokas was still in evening dress, as Fenton had left him 
 
 53 
 
H YET 
 
 at midnight, in the hotel lobby, while Peter in his gay red, 
 blue and yellow silk pajamas looked rather like Palm Beach. 
 Smokas managed a small smile, 
 
 "People used to say, 'No man is a hero to his valet,' 
 but I must say, Mr. Fenton, that's a becoming outfit to you. 
 I can see the hero-look, just as plainly as when you wear 
 more conventional clothes." Peter looked a bit embarrassed, 
 and picked up a long black silk dressing gown to wrap 
 about him. Then Smokas actually laughed, 
 
 "You can't do anything about it, Mr. Fenton, for now 
 you look like a Supreme Court judge." Fenton smiled and 
 remarked, 
 
 "Perhaps you've read what the great philosopher Hegel 
 said in rebuttal of that valet remark: 'This is not because 
 the Hero is no Hero, but because the Valet is a Valet.' 
 That's a class, John Smokas, where no man would ever 
 place you." John's face sobered, and Peter Fenton realized 
 for the first time that Smokas was alarmingly pale, 
 
 "I didn't waken you at three o'clock to try to be funny, 
 and I believe you're the only man in the universe who could 
 have got a smile out of me. This proof sheet was obtained 
 for me during the last hour by a very good friend of mine. 
 It will go on the wire tomorrow to all the opposition papers 
 in the country, to appear in Sunday morning papers. 
 Whether we can do anything about it or not, I don't know. 
 But I certainly do know minutes are precious." 
 
 He took from a pocket a long strip of wrinkled yel- 
 lowish paper; one of the galley proofs with which both 
 men were familiar. Without a further word he handed 
 it to Peter Fenton, who sat down at the desk in the room, 
 with his back to Smokas, to read the document. 
 
 Once read through, he proceeded to go over it again, 
 and then in parts a third time. The city noises were quiet 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 55 
 
 at their height above the city. There was absolute stillness 
 in the room. All at once it came to Fenton that these min- 
 utes must be torture to John Smokas. He turned his chair, 
 and looked over to the younger man with what the latter 
 always felt was the most memorable and the warmest smile 
 he ever received in his life, 
 
 "John, pardon me. I went off selfishly on a train of 
 thought, not realizing I was leaving you hanging on the 
 hooks." He held the galley up in front of him, reading 
 aloud the headlines : 
 
 FENTON PICKS 
 RED RADICAL 
 AS SECRETARY 
 
 Below in smaller type was printed what newspaper men 
 call the "deck," or the secondary headline, 
 
 No Denial Made 
 To Charge Smokas 
 Fired as Subversive 
 
 The article beneath the heading, which practically con- 
 tained all the charge, merely asserted that in the preceding 
 fall John Smokas was appointed to a position on the faculty 
 of Cartwright college. But before the first semester closed, 
 the teacher had been dismissed for red radical activities by 
 President William H. Harney, now known the country over 
 as the hero college president, who gave his life in a dormi- 
 tory fire, in an endeavor to save six freshmen boys. 
 
 Since that time, the article continued, Smokas had been 
 out of public life, until he was deliberately chosen by Peter 
 Fenton as his confidential aid and private secretary. 
 
 It was left for the editorial writers of the various sheets 
 which would use the wire story to make what handling of 
 
56 YET 
 
 the story seemed advisable to them. Fenton and Smokas 
 both knew with what wicked glee many papers would re- 
 ceive the news. 
 
 "No chance of heading it off, do you think?" Smokas 
 asked in a low tone, with his eyes on the floor. His friend 
 had urgently proposed that Fenton use $500,000 or a mil- 
 lion, if necessary, for stopping the story. 
 
 "I don't think so," Fenton said gravely. "Merely the 
 fact of your resignation was printed in both Fentonia 
 papers, but on the other hand, the student indignation was 
 so great that the truth underlying the resignation came to 
 the knowledge of a great many people. What was your 
 thought, a denial?" 
 
 "No-o-o, — but the man who brought me the galley 
 rather thought, since the other side is so pushed for cam- 
 paign expenses, that — possibly — 
 
 "We would try to buy them off? John Smokas, if I 
 thought that were your own plan, this would be the ending 
 of the ways for you and me. I'd rather spend my days feed- 
 ing Roxie out in the park than sit in the White House with 
 a bribe written on my soul." 
 
 John Smokas leaned his head against the foot of the bed, 
 and his voice was choked as he said, 
 
 "I ought never to have accepted this job, Mr. Fenton. 
 Would it be too late if I resigned now?" Fenton came over 
 and laid his hand on the young man's shoulder, 
 
 "I believe you're taking this thing too seriously. You 
 and I both need to make up on sleep. It'll help us get back 
 to saner thinking. There are a few things I would like to 
 say, and then we'll put this matter out of our minds, and 
 we'll resolve not to be upset by any backwash of remarks 
 and editorials that grow out of the story. The truth is not a 
 discredit to either of us. 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 57 
 
 "There is great need for you and me to get down to 
 brass tacks about President Harney. As you may or may not 
 know, he was elected while I was in Europe last year, on 
 that commission for trade agreements. He would not have 
 been my choice, but it was necessary, or the board so judged, 
 to have a president immediately on the ground, so what was 
 to be done, was done. 
 
 "That old ruling, about the president's doing all the 
 hiring and firing, had been in abeyance for years. Indeed, 
 there was either misunderstanding or sharp practice, on the 
 part of Harney — probably the former — concerning the rule. 
 It distinctly says — and I should have made an issue about it, 
 had the fire not changed matters — that in an emergency, the 
 president has the power of engaging and dismissing faculty 
 members. But that in the regular course of events, such 
 action on his part must be approved by the board. 
 
 "With a board investigation, you would not have been 
 dismissed. You may have said some harsh things about the 
 government to the boys — but the government has been very 
 vulnerable. Those statements about your giving wine to the 
 boys — I was told at the time it was cider and the popular 
 soft drinks." John Smokas nodded, but his face didn't 
 lighten, 
 
 "Give a dog a bad name and you might as well kill 
 him," he said in a doleful tone. Peter laughed outright, 
 
 "O John, you've got a bad case of blues! Get some sleep 
 and you'll be my old cheerful pal again. Remember, we 
 can't buck a hero. Criticize Harney, and we will be dead 
 ducks. Stiffen your back — say 'pooh!' if you want to, to the 
 reports. You and I'll stick together till the returns come in 
 — and many a long day thereafter, please Heaven!" 
 
Chapter XIV 
 
 Peter Fenton was the richest man, since George Wash- 
 ington, to be proposed for the presidency of the United 
 States. In his time, Washington was the richest man in 
 America. Some thought the fact of Fenton's wealth might 
 work against him in the race for the presidency; Smokas 
 thought not, arid he had a keen knowledge of people and 
 power of observation that availed more than a post-card 
 poll. 
 
 As for Fenton himself, in the few times he referred to it 
 in private conversation, never having discussed it as a public 
 issue, he had always said, 
 
 "My books are open. My business affairs have always 
 been honest. I think myself I have skill in handling large 
 businesses, but I should like to know if the United States 
 is not the largest business of all? A business should be sol- 
 vent, wise in care of its personnel, and fair with its custom- 
 ers, with courtesy and square-dealing toward its competitors. 
 I have never formulated a national party platform, but so 
 far as I see at present, that might be the gist of one." 
 
 This wise saying of Peter Fenton gained far wider pub- 
 licity than any canard about his engagement of a supposed 
 radical secretary. Instinctively men and women felt con- 
 fidence that this man who had managed his own affairs so 
 wisely could be trusted with the nation. To Smokas and the 
 men actively engaged in campaign plans, the days before 
 the national nominating convention seemed to go by on 
 wings. 
 
 Underneath the great plans, the sub-plan which involved 
 Roxie, the elephant, progressed famously. Vigorously 
 tutored by old Jim, and whenever possible, by little Alice, 
 and rewarded by many a half peck of her favorite arti- 
 
 58 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 59 
 
 chokes, Roxie was ready to shout "Peter!" in a tone that 
 made the word clearly recognizable. Old Jim was about 
 ready to burst with pride at her achievements. 
 
 The arrangement of the convention hall proved highly 
 favorable to the plans Smokas desired to make concerning 
 the elephant. It was his idea that after a strong nominating 
 speech for Peter Fenton should be made, and while the 
 many minutes of applause should be going on, the rear of 
 the stage should open and Roxie, attended by Jim and little 
 Alice, should appear. The delegates would be astonished, 
 and would hush their applauding. Then Roxie, after sur- 
 veying the hall calmly, would give her great shout, 
 
 "Peter! Peter!" Of course an excellent speaker would 
 be provided to second the nomination, but in the publicity 
 and in the pictures that would flood the nation, it would 
 seem as though the very spirit of the party had appeared 
 to give the seconding. 
 
 There wasn't a slip-up in the finest minutiae of the 
 planning. Glorious weather marked the convention period. 
 From Peter Fenton down to the delegate with the smallest 
 constituency behind him a cheerful spirit of hope for suc- 
 cess seemed to buoy everyone. It was frequently remarked 
 by old convention goers that the national spirit which had 
 seemed to be quenched by the depression was alive again 
 and in great shape. 
 
 Peter Fenton was probably the most surprised one in 
 the great convention audience when Roxie appeared. To 
 the most of them she was just an elephant, perhaps from a 
 local zoo or a visiting circus. Until the press that night 
 heralded the value of the achievement, many did not know 
 how extraordinary it is for an elephant to burst into speech. 
 
 But the case with Peter was entirely different. He had 
 made a trip by air to Fentonia shortly before the convention, 
 
60 YET 
 
 and Roxie was among the ones honored by a visit from him. 
 Old Jim and his signals were kept carefully out of the way, 
 and the great secret of the elephant's accomplishment wasn't 
 revealed. Both the Fentonian Times and Tocsin offices 
 knew all about the pleasant conspiracy, but had agreed to 
 keep it a dark secret until the proper day. Peter wondered 
 why both papers had photographers out at the park, to take 
 every angle of his visit with Roxie, but he had long since 
 grown case-hardened to the vagaries of press camera men. 
 When Roxie shouted "Peter!" on the convention plat- 
 form every man of the thousands packed into the hall 
 sprang to his feet and the tremendous yell of "Peter!" that 
 followed must have sounded to high heaven. All records 
 of length of applauding in former conventions were broken. 
 To every corner of the nation excited men were sending 
 over the wires, 
 
 "CONVENTION SWEPT OFF FEET 
 SPIRIT OF PARTY SALUTES PETER" 
 
 Like a flash, the clever party leader who was to have 
 seconded the nomination caught the inspiration, and 
 changed entirely the talk he was to have made, 
 
 "Roxie calls upon me to say to you that the elephant 
 never forgets!" he began — and then had to wait for the 
 assemblage to quiet down. 
 
 "She calls 'Peter!' and as you saw, every heart in this 
 great company, which represents the entire nation, re- 
 sponded. This has been a scene unprecedented in national 
 history. Not one of you who saw it will ever forget it, 
 and you are going to all points from the Suwanee to the 
 Columbia, from the Saco to the Rio Grande, to take this 
 feeling home to the party in every section of the country. 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 61 
 
 "Roxie spoke, but do not think of it merely as an ele- 
 phant's trumpet voice — think of it as the spirit of wisdom 
 revealed through her, — a mighty call from the nation's 
 need for Peter Fenton to take the helm and steer us straight 
 to solvency, security and success. 
 
 "Gentlemen, I have the honor of seconding the nomi- 
 nation of Peter Fenton of Illinois as candidate for the 
 presidency of the United States." The convention couldn't 
 take that seated — the men were up marching and shouting 
 in the aisles: "Fenton! Fenton! Peter Fenton!" 
 
 It was a landslide, and the nomination was secure. 
 
 Half of Fentonia, apparently, had come to the con- 
 vention. Peter Fenton shook hands until his right hand 
 was as swollen as was that of Abraham Lincoln after the 
 historic night of his nomination. When he shook hands 
 with Mrs. Harney, who of course had accompanied Alice 
 to the scene of Roxie's triumph, he used both hands ; taking 
 her left and right also. His eyes were shining as few had 
 seen them shine. 
 
 At three the next morning this time it was Peter Fenton 
 who had a wee tinkle-call put on the telephone in John 
 Smokas' bedroom. Smokas came on the run, fearing some 
 emergency. Instead he found an exceedingly placid Peter, 
 clad again in gay pajamas and the judicial-appearing black 
 silk robe. 
 
 "What is it, sir?" he asked eagerly. Peter smiled, 
 
 "I can see I did well to call. I was afraid you were 
 going to stay keyed up all night, and I wanted to ad- 
 minister a soporific. Now listen to this — it's the finest thing 
 about an elephant I ever expect to come across. One of 
 the newspaper men here in the city, who is an elephant 
 fancier, copied this for me from his elephant scrapbook, 
 and brought it to the dinner at the hotel. 
 
62 YET 
 
 "It was written by the English poet, Wilfred Blunt. 
 
 " 'For ages Thou didst build 
 Their frame capacity; the hide which was their shield 
 No thorn might pierce, no sting, no violent tooth assail ; 
 The tusks which were their levers ; the lithe trunk, their 
 
 flail. 
 Thou strengthenedst their deep brain. Thou madest 
 
 them wise to know 
 And wiser to ignore; advised, deliberate, slow, 
 Conscious of power supreme in right. The manifest 
 
 token 
 Of Thy high will on earth, Thy natural peace unbroken, 
 Unbreakable by fear. For ages they did move 
 Thus, — kings of Thy deep forest, swayed by only love." 
 
 Peter Fenton was absorbed by the beauty and power 
 of what he was reading. When he looked across for 
 agreement to John Smokas, the young man was sound 
 asleep. 
 
 "Poor chap," Peter murmured. "I think he hasn't 
 closed his eyes for two nights. Well, that's what I 
 brought him in for — to get him into the sleep-mood." 
 
Chapter XV 
 
 After the convention matters calmed greatly for all of 
 the Fentonia group. Mrs. Harney took little Alice and 
 went on to New England to visit relatives. Proud Jim and 
 placid Roxie contentedly rode in an elephant freight car, 
 rented from a circus, back to the quiet Sarah Fenton park. 
 Even the faithful Smokas vanished for a short, well-earned 
 vacation in various parts of the east, and it so happened that 
 Peter Fenton arrived in Fentonia as he had hoped to do, 
 unheralded, like any private citizen. 
 
 The town looked good to him. He peered down into 
 the Sangamon, flowing low between its banks in summer 
 weather, and wondered how Abraham Lincoln felt as he 
 came back to that river, after the excitements of his first 
 convention. No man, he felt, could be the center of great 
 mass enthusiasm without some effect being made upon him. 
 His mouth twisted a bit wryly, and he said to himself. 
 
 "Mustn't be getting the big-head at your age, Peter!" 
 
 Smokas and various party leaders had anxiously asked 
 him concerning his plans for the interim before the Novem- 
 ber election. Peter had given the quiet smile which was 
 one of his greatest charms, 
 
 "This reminds me a bit," he said, "of the famous old 
 story of John Wesley, when he was asked what he would 
 do if he knew he were to die at midnight. He calmly 
 replied he should conduct such and such a meeting that 
 he had appointed ; that he should dine at the regular time ; 
 preach in the evening, by his custom; say his evening 
 prayers, and go to bed — he would hope, to waken in 
 heaven. 
 
 "My own work has always kept me busy," Fenton con- 
 tinued, "and whether I do or do not resign the chief care 
 
 63 
 
64 YET 
 
 of it later, at present there are many calls upon me. I have 
 always had great admiration for men of the past who 
 became chief executives who, if they campaigned at all, 
 carried on a quiet, so-called 'porch campaign'. The porches 
 are wide, up at the mansion, and I will give the warmest 
 welcome of which I am capable to any delegation of 
 visitors. But as for 'swinging around the circle', as it 
 used to be called, I do not feel it is a part of my duty." 
 
 The country took his decision very well. With the 
 press, the radio and the camera, a public man is not al- 
 lowed to be out of sight or out of mind, even if he should 
 desire this extreme privacy. With every move that Peter 
 Fenton made, men seemed to realize more the remarkable 
 balance of his nature, so fitted to keep the ship of state 
 on an even keel in troublous times. 
 
 The second night after Peter Fenton's return to the 
 mansion he sat down before his desk, made sure his fountain 
 pen was filled, and took out several sheets of his private 
 stationery. He smiled to himself as he wondered how many 
 years it had been since he wrote a long-hand letter, — 
 
 "But that's the only proper way to write a ", he 
 
 mused, without finishing the sentence. 
 
 "My dear Mrs. Harney," he began. Rhetoric had told 
 him this was a more formal beginning than "Dear", but 
 he had never been able to see it. He continued, 
 
 "I am planning to take my post of president of Cart- 
 wright college trustees very seriously this summer. With 
 the swift erection of the new Harney Hall on hand, there 
 is much to be done, and much to be planned. 
 
 "It would be improper for me to ask you to shorten 
 in any way your visits in the east, and yet I greatly desire 
 to ask you to take the place of adviser for the improve- 
 ments of the summer, in the college. I am sure we both 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 65 
 
 want to make the new dormitory a model for that sort of a 
 building; — a genuine home for Freshmen boys. I have a 
 feeling that a woman like you could set us all right — 
 architects included — about many home details that might 
 be added. So I shall be glad if you will let me know when 
 you and little Alice plan to return. 
 
 "Tell Alice that I went out to see Roxie last night, and 
 I took her a bag of those California artichokes which ele- 
 phants seem to prefer to sugar lumps. Roxie made the 
 welkin ring, out in the park, shouting 'Peter!' — and I 
 reckon every man, woman and child in the park came 
 running to see her do it. I met old John Robinson a time 
 or two, in his lifetime, and I think I know now just how 
 proud he felt when his Tillie called to him. — But Roxie is 
 the A No. 1 winner — isn't she, little Alice? For even Tillie 
 didn't call out 7 onn '' 
 
 "Returning to more serious things. I have given some 
 thought to the fact that with the burning of Lincoln Hall, 
 and the subsequent vote of the trustees — wise, of course, 
 and fully justified — to call the new dormitory Harney Hall, 
 it will leave the campus without a memorial to Abraham 
 Lincoln. This is not as it should be. Don't you agree? 
 
 "Ninety to a hundred years ago in this country was a 
 great era for college and university founding. Not a man 
 living at that time, I believe, approved more of this trend 
 than Lincoln. Boys should not have to study alone, by 
 pitch-pine firelight, as he had done. There were no definite 
 records made of his sayings and doings on Cartwright col- 
 lege campus, because no one realized in those days that his 
 every word had value. But we do know he came there, and 
 that he approved. 
 
 "I've already given considerable thought as to the form 
 which the memorial should take, but I'm entirely open to 
 
66 YET 
 
 conviction — and especially open to advice from you. Since 
 it is my plan to finance the Lincoln memorial, as a, — well, 
 as sort of thank-offering, I suppose it will be my privilege 
 to choose the form it will take. Yet I should like to be 
 wisely guided. 
 
 "At first I thought of an observatory, such as the one 
 on Mount Wilson, in California, but the practical astrono- 
 mers with whom I have talked have dissuaded me. The 
 moist, lowland atmosphere here is not adapted to star- 
 gazing. So I have turned my thought to some such a 
 memorial as Bok built, down in Florida. No one can say 
 a low flat country is not adapted to bells, — for witness 
 Belgium — leading country for chimes! The 'Lincoln Caril- 
 lon' — how does that sound to you? Wouldn't you enjoy 
 helping choose the site for it? — The idea grows on me; — ■ 
 even as I write, it grows. 
 
 "But I am imposing upon you with an extraordinarily 
 long letter. Let its length measure my impatience to know 
 when you and little Alice will return. 
 
 "Cordially yours, 
 
 Peter Fenton." 
 
 "Let me see," he said to himself, as he carefully affixed 
 two stamps to the fat letter, holding so many sheets written 
 in his large, emphatic handwriting, — "Seems to me I have 
 the memory, from my old Latin days, that 'cor' has some- 
 thing to do with the heart!" 
 
Chapter XVI 
 
 If Paul Revere had come on his galloping horse through 
 the streets of Medford, Massachusetts, again, it would 
 hardly have caused more surprise in one household than 
 the arrival of a fat two-stamped letter, bearing the return 
 address in the corner of the envelope of a presidential 
 nominee. 
 
 The letter arrived before Mrs. Harney and little Alice, 
 who were visiting at the home of cousins, had come down 
 to breakfast. From father and mother to children, all of 
 the family was in quite a twitter to have Mrs. Harney 
 arrive to open it. When she came she did not seem much 
 excited, though pretty pink color rose in her cheeks. 
 
 "You will excuse me if I open it?" she said. 
 
 "We certainly wouldn't excuse you if you didn't," the 
 hostess answered laughingly. "We're simply dying to know 
 what the President of the United States wants to say to 
 our Alice — and such a thick letter, too!" Mrs. Harney 
 slipped the tine of a fork into the letter-corner and slit 
 it open. 
 
 "Hand-written," muttered the cousin's husband. Mrs. 
 Harney was absorbed in the reading, and did not notice 
 the comment. All of the family tried politely to be ab- 
 sorbed in their breakfast, but the children giggled when 
 their mother absent mindedly put seven lumps of sugar 
 in her coffee. Mrs. Harney drew a long breath as she 
 finished the last page. Her eyes looked very bright, 
 
 "It's from Mr. Peter Fenton, who I told you was so 
 kind to Alice and me. It is not at all a private letter — I'll 
 read it aloud. — Indeed, I think I should, in any case, for 
 it will explain why I shall probably cut our eastern visits 
 short." 
 
 67 
 
68 YET 
 
 She read it in a quiet, rather expressionless tone, and 
 the letter did not sound very exciting. For the paragraph 
 addressed to little Alice, about Roxie the elephant, she put 
 a smile into her eyes and voice, and that part of the letter 
 sounded more human than the rest of it. The Medford 
 family listened with great respect. As she closed, 
 
 "Do you feel you must go right back, Cousin Alice?" 
 the hostess asked. 
 
 "What's the need of rushing?" demanded the husband. 
 "You'll have all summer ahead of you. From what I know 
 of architects and contractors, you'll deserve a gold medal 
 if you get a single shelf in a closet if they had not planned 
 to put it there. That bell-tower business is a slow job, too. 
 You and Alice need some good bracing New England air, 
 rather than those hot prairies. Eat your breakfast and then 
 sit down over at the desk and tell him pretty that you'll 
 come when you're good and ready — along towards Septem- 
 ber, maybe. We want to take little Alice down to the 
 beaches and give her a coat of sun-tan." Mrs. Harney 
 smiled, slowly, 
 
 "You are both awfully kind, — but I have a feeling I 
 should go back. — Perhaps Alice might stay — " But Alice 
 jumped from her chair and ran to clutch her mother by 
 the shoulder, 
 
 "O Mother, NO! I've got to stay right with you and 
 take care of you! Dr. Smokas told me I had to, when he 
 said good bye, in New York." Then Mrs. Harney really 
 laughed, 
 
 "There seem to be a good many complicated injunctions 
 and unsuspected duties around here. I do thank you dears, 
 and it's a real disappointment to start west so quickly, but 
 as I said, I think I must." A little silence fell around the 
 table, which one of the children broke by saying, 
 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 69 
 
 "How tall is Mr. Fenton, Cousin Alice?" 
 
 "I believe they say he is six feet, four inches." 
 
 "And how tall are you, Cousin Alice?" 
 
 "Why, you funny child! — I believe they used to say I 
 was just five feet tall, but I can't remember being measured 
 for years." 
 
 "Say, Cousin Alice," burst out the other Medford child 
 at the breakfast table, — "if you two stood side by side you'd 
 look like the Trylon and the Perisphere!" — It was so 
 ridiculous that the whole table burst out laughing. The 
 mother said apologetically, 
 
 "The children's visit to the Fair was the great event 
 of their young lives, and we've heard of the Trylon and 
 Perisphere on all occasions." Little Alice, however, was 
 not disposed to do much laughing. She glared at her little 
 second cousin, 
 
 "I don't know why you say 'Perisphere' to my mother 
 — she's just as slim and pretty as a — as a fashion show 
 model!" She was really on the verge of tears. "What a 
 hectic breakfast this has been!" thought the hostess, with 
 a sigh. The host relieved the tension by rising hastily, 
 
 "Great Scott, — I ought to be in Boston in ten minutes! 
 See you tonight, anyhow, won't I, Alice!" And he was 
 gone. 
 
 "Now I suppose you'll want to write your letter," re- 
 marked the cousin. "I'll take the children in the car and 
 go to market, leaving you in peace to write. Then when 
 we come back we can mail it for you." So much insistence 
 on her writing roused an uncommon irritation in Mrs. 
 Harney's usual placid nature. She spoke with decision, 
 
 "So far as I can see there is no need at all for me to 
 answer the letter." Her cousin looked at her with open 
 mouth, 
 
70 YET 
 
 "Not write? Not answer Mr. Fenton?" 
 
 "No," Mrs. Harney said shortly. "I wouldn't know 
 what to say to those remarks about the hall and the bells. 
 And what difference will it make about my writing, if I 
 get there about as soon as a letter. I think I'll wire Mrs. 
 Reuben Fenton, my landlady, and that will cover everything 
 necessary." She did not realize that out in Illinois a man 
 of some importance would be disappointed with each mail 
 that arrived from the east. 
 
 So it happened that the Fenton twins, Iona and Leona, 
 met their Uncle Peter Fenton Friday noon at the foot of 
 the stairs leading to the Daily Tocsin office. The faces of 
 the girls were beaming, and Iona called, 
 
 "O Uncle Peter, we've had such a nice telegram!" He 
 mimicked the tone cleverly, and said, 
 
 "O Nieces, I've had such a fine telegram today!" 
 
 "But you get telegrams just by dozens, all the time, 
 Uncle Peter, — while at our house, a telegram is a big 
 event." 
 
 "Well, I liked mine well enough to carry it around," 
 he answered, and pulled out the yellow scrap, to read: 
 
 " 'Due back Sunday night — Glad to come — Home is best. 
 John I. Smokas.' How's that?" 
 
 "Great minds must think alike, Uncle Peter," giggled 
 the twins. Now you listen to this : 
 
 ' 'We arrive in Fentonia Sunday night — Glad to come 
 home.' Alice J. Harney' " — To the 
 
 twins' extreme amazement, their uncle's face blackened like 
 a thundercloud. 
 
 "When did that come, did you say?" 
 
 "This morning? — Humph!" — And he was gone! 
 
Chapter XVII 
 
 Peter Fenton came out on the broad porch at the 
 mansion Sunday night and sat down to look at the full 
 moon, looking at him affably through the oaks that had 
 stood there long before there was a Fentonia. Neither the 
 moon nor the sound of the Chicago express, whistling in, 
 seemed to give him any appreciable pleasure. He had 
 decided it was a "blue Sunday". The natural reaction from 
 the tremendous strain of the nominating convention was 
 affecting him, without his fully realizing it. 
 
 The twins, Iona and Leona Fenton, had brought the 
 family car to the station, to welcome the travellers. They 
 saw them coming up the long platform, Alice with her 
 hand on Smokas's arm, and talking excitedly to him. 
 
 "Isn't this grand to see you all!" shouted the twins. 
 Smokas looked around inquiringly, 
 
 "Somehow I rather expected to see Peter Fenton down 
 here; perhaps with Roxie on a string," The twins giggled 
 with mischief, and Leona, always the more tactless of the 
 two, remarked, 
 
 "Uncle Peter looked as mad as a wet hen Friday noon, 
 when he found out you folks were coming out together." 
 Mrs. Harney put her head up sharply, and both she and 
 Smokas queried, 
 
 "Together? What d'ya mean?" She added, 
 
 "Didn't you tell him my telegram was sent from Med- 
 ford, Mass.?" "And mine from Long Island," added 
 Smokas. The man and woman looked at each other in 
 embarrassment. 
 
 "But you both said the same things," Leona told them. 
 "Seems as if you must have been together when you wrote 
 'em." 
 
 71 
 
72 YET 
 
 "Well, we weren't," Smokas countered. "I came out by 
 plane to Chicago this morning from New York, and I've 
 been at the party headquarters all day. I didn't even know 
 they were on this train until we were about half way home, 
 when I walked through the cars to see who was aboard. — 
 Oh, you kids imagine things!" 
 
 The whole group felt vaguely uncomfortable. Mrs. 
 Harney and Alice were tired from the journey. When Iona 
 asked, 
 
 "Where shall we drop you, Dr. Smokas?" he answered, 
 
 "Take the ladies home, and then swing by the mansion 
 for me. I have a grist of good things to report to him." 
 
 Peter Fenton did not rise in greeting as Smokas hur- 
 ried up the wide path to the mansion, but the latter's en- 
 thusiasm did not seem to be dampened, 
 
 "Just the best news everywhere, Mr. Fenton!" he called 
 out before he climbed the steps. "Clubs forming, young 
 men crusading — some of the finest editorials you ever read, 
 being printed. They say there has never been anything 
 like it. New England adores you, because they've got your 
 great-grandfather's bones down at Plymouth; the south likes 
 you because your mother was a beautiful Kentuckian, and 
 her father was a Confederate general; California likes you, 
 because you own so many oil wells out there, and up north, 
 they say they like you because you've fished in every state 
 along the Canada border. Oh, it's great stuff!" 
 
 "Let us go into the library," Fenton said. But seated in 
 his familiar chair, with Smokas waiting to follow whatever 
 lead might be given, he kept silence a few minutes. Then 
 he said suddenly, 
 
 "Do you plan to marry Alice Harney?" Smokas' chin 
 fairly dropped, with amazement. His thoughts had been 
 far away, on various aspects of the campaign. 
 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 73 
 
 "Marry Alice?" he gasped, "Why, she's only ten years 
 old!" Peter Fenton gave an impatient movement, and said 
 sternly, 
 
 "Naturally, I mean the mother. Do you?" 
 
 John Smokas, with his quick, almost feminine intuition, 
 realized at once that this was a serious matter with his 
 chief, and sobered his look and tone accordingly, 
 
 "I assure you, sir, that I have never given a moment's 
 thought to such a relation. I admire Mrs. Harney, thor- 
 oughly, for her womanly qualities and her fine mind, but 
 I have no romantic feeling for her." 
 
 Peter Fenton sat silently for a moment, then he threw 
 his head back and laughed, long and heartily, 
 
 "I believe, John, the proverb-makers were right, when 
 they declared, 'There's no fool like an old fool.' ' He 
 continued to laugh, revealing the relief he was feeling at 
 John's declaration. Smokas went into action at once, 
 
 "Never quote a thing like that in regard to yourself, 
 sir. At forty-five, if I do not mistake, you are the youngest 
 man who has run for the presidential chair, except Theodore 
 Roosevelt, who was forty-two. — And Teddy was all sorts 
 of laws unto himself. The mold that made him was broken 
 at his birth." Smokas had purposely talked on, to give 
 Peter Fenton time to gain control of himself. 
 
 "I seem to be a man just now," said Fenton slowly, 
 "whose life is greatly controlled by conventions — used in 
 two senses. My outward life for months to come, whatever 
 the ultimate outcome, will be arranged in accord with the 
 recent convention we have just attended — while my inner 
 life and soul is hampered and constrained by a confounded 
 social convention!" 
 
 "Do you mind explaining a little more?" Smokas said 
 quietly. He felt sure that to talk would relieve the strain 
 
74 YET 
 
 Fenton seemed to be feeling. The night was oddly cool for 
 summer in Illinois. Materials for a small fire were always 
 laid in readiness in Peter's grate, and now he bent down 
 and touched a match to them, 
 
 "I believe I can think clearer, if I have coals to poke," 
 he said, with a brief smile. Then he continued; talking as 
 he had never talked to anyone, 
 
 "Probably I have never at any time in my life been what 
 is called a 'lady's man'. As you know, my parents died 
 early, and my grandmother, the Sarah Fenton for whom 
 Roxie's park is named, — brought me up and directed the 
 life here at the mansion. She liked boys better than girls, 
 and the place abounded with boys during my high school 
 and Cartwright days — grand times we had, too. 
 
 "She kept the house ready for my return at any moment, 
 while I studied in the east, and in Europe. Still there were 
 no other women in my life. If I thought of women and 
 marriage, it seemed to me a matter for the distant future. 
 
 "Then last December 18 that door behind you opened, 
 and a woman, Alice Harney, walked over to this desk. I 
 did not realize it so much at the very moment, but later I 
 found that her visit and the impact of her personality had 
 done something strange indeed to me. Perhaps you are 
 one of those who sniff at the idea of love at first sight? — ■ 
 (John Smokas silently shook his head) — Well, as near as 
 I can understand it, that is what happened to me. 
 
 "There is no use in wasting time and breath in study- 
 ing on what my plight would have been, if the hero-death 
 of President Harney had not taken place. In fact, I'd rather 
 not think about it. But John, — can't you see my problem? 
 — Tied, fettered even, by the wretched convention that will 
 not let me hold her hand, much less, try to make her love 
 me, until another December has gone by! 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 75 
 
 "Just when I need strong faith and love to buoy me up 
 and give me confidence, — just when I have a thousand 
 problems that demand all my best powers, — I am likely 
 to be put through wearing hells of jealousy, such as I've 
 had this week-end. 
 
 "John, what shall I do?" Smokas too leaned over and 
 poked the coals for a few minutes for inspiration, before 
 he answered. All at once his face lighted with a sudden 
 smile, 
 
 "You remember reading me the little poem about the 
 two lumps of burning coal in the grate? It made very 
 little connection in my mind that day with any real expe- 
 rience, but I can begin to see it from your standpoint now. 
 
 "Oddly enough, I ran across another short bit of grate- 
 verse the other day — it might well be by the same author. 
 Now hear mine, and see if it isn't almost a prescription: 
 
 "FIRE UNLIGHTED 
 
 There lies the kindling, skillful-crossed; 
 
 The coal is placed a-top; 
 The matches are within my hand, — 
 
 Oh, why, — why do I stop ? 
 Heart, you are ready for his love ; 
 
 Strings tuned in your singing lyre ; 
 What stays my voice to speak the word 
 
 That sets my soul afire?" 
 
 Responding to John's poking, the fire in the grate 
 snapped cheerily, but the men were silent. Finally Peter 
 said, 
 
 "Well,— so what, John?" 
 
 "I'm a tremendous believer in truth, and the power of 
 truth. — You are too. See your bookplate with its motto: 
 
16 
 
 YET 
 
 'Prima est Veritas'. 'Conventions', in your second sense, 
 are for the world and his wife. I think I would let there 
 be absolute truth between you and Alice Harney, at the 
 earliest possible moment." 
 
Chapter XVIII 
 
 It was a gorgeous summer morning in Illinois. By two 
 o'clock in the afternoon it might be almost too hot to be 
 borne in comfort, but as a morning, Paradise couldn't 
 beat it. 
 
 The two families in the Reuben Fenton house had scat- 
 tered. Mrs. Fenton drove to market, leaving the twins on 
 the way at the Daily Tocsin office, where they were ex- 
 officio social editor assistants. Little Alice Harney had been 
 invited and had gone happily to an all-day Girl Scout picnic, 
 well supervised and protected. Mrs. Harney was alone in 
 the house. She went at once to the telephone. 
 
 It happened that Peter Fenton was also alone in his 
 library that Monday morning, when the telephone by his 
 side rang, 
 
 "Fenton speaking," he said in a casual voice, much 
 different from his next reply. 
 
 "This is Mrs. Harney, Mr. Fenton. I feel I owe you an 
 apology for not having sent an answer to your kind letter 
 which gave Alice and me so much pleasure." 
 
 "O my dear lady, no apology at all is needed. It seems 
 to me you must have picked up your bags within an hour, 
 and started west. That was the very finest kind of an 
 answer." She spoke earnestly, 
 
 "That is indeed just the way it was, Mr. Fenton. My 
 relatives, where we were visiting, in Medford, Mass., 
 heard the letter, and in spite of it, urged us to stay on. 
 But I felt so anxious to help out here, in any least little 
 way I could, that I went right to packing. I suppose if I 
 were as up-to-date as Dr. Smokas, we would have taken a 
 plane. When he came into our Pullman, at Joliet, little 
 Alice was greatly entertained by his adventures." 
 
 77 
 
78 YET 
 
 The name of Smokas seemed like an exhortation to 
 Peter Fenton. He said abruptly, 
 
 "See here, where are you now, and are you busy?" 
 
 "Not busy at all. Little Alice has gone on an all-day 
 Scout picnic, and these dear Fenton friends have my apart- 
 ment here in such shining order that I could see my face 
 in the furniture, if I should look." Peter Fenton's mind 
 worked rapidly, and rejected several plans. In a moment 
 he said, 
 
 "I have a wonderful new elephant figure here that I 
 should like to show you. It came as the gift of a friend, 
 sent from Tibet, while we were gone. He's a newspaper 
 man, who was sent over for his paper to learn what he 
 could about this mysterious new child Dai-lama, who is 
 supposed now to rule in Tibet. The elephant has turquoises 
 on his backbone, and golden toe-nails. Wouldn't you like 
 to see him?" 
 
 "Oh, I would indeed!" 
 
 "I'll drive right over for you." 
 
 Now Peter Fenton's elephant room, it may be under- 
 stood, was one of the most peaceful and private places to 
 be found in half a dozen states. Its only key joined a Phi 
 Beta Kappa key on his watch-chain, for even Sarah, the 
 head housekeeper, had said she didn't want the responsi- 
 bility of such a key. When the room needed her, Mr. 
 Fenton would let her in. 
 
 In the present emergency Peter Fenton sought Sarah 
 at once. He gave directions that to all comers, or telephone- 
 ringers, she was to say that Mr. Fenton was in the city, 
 but had left no word where he was to be found. He gave 
 an affectionate pat to her shoulder, 
 
 "I will be at home for luncheon at one o'clock, and I 
 hope to bring Mrs. Harney with me. Set the small table 
 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 79 
 
 in the little breakfast room that has a river view — and make 
 it the best luncheon of your life, Sarah!" 
 
 When the large car stopped in front of the Reuben 
 Fenton home, Mrs. Harney opened the side door, and came 
 down the elm-shaded path at once. She made a pretty 
 picture for a summer morning, wearing a white costume 
 and wide white hat. In her hand she had two or three 
 pink roses from the Reuben Fenton garden. Peter sprang 
 out and placed her solicitously on the car's luxurious back 
 seat, taking then a place beside her. 
 
 "Back to the mansion, Willy," he said briefly to the 
 colored man on the front seat. 
 
 Mrs. Harney smiled and remarked, 
 
 "It seems odd to be going without little Alice, but I 
 suppose I ought not to make too much of a mother-baby 
 of her. In the east, my cousins wanted her to stay on, for 
 the sea-bathing, but she declared Dr. Smokas had told her 
 she must take care of me, and she wouldn't hear to it." 
 
 "Nice child," Peter agreed. "We'll plan some long 
 rides, one of these days, with her along." At that very 
 minute he had the plan for a most astonishing wedding 
 journey in his mind, — with little Alice as a part of it! 
 
 In the elephant room, all was art and comfort and 
 beauty. — And most valued of all by a man in public life, 
 there was exquisite privacy. The chairs and divans were 
 deep and soft. Peter had arranged the glasses for a cool 
 summer drink on a small table. Mrs. Harney took off her 
 hat and sank back in the corner of a deep divan, breathing, 
 
 "Did you ever see a place so restful as this is!" Peter 
 smiled warmly at her, and brought her the small Tibetan 
 elephant at once, for her to view its many charms. Sud- 
 denly he said, 
 
 "Do you like to overhear a conversation?" 
 
80 YET 
 
 "Overhear? — I don't believe I know what you mean, 
 Mr. Fenton." Mrs. Harney was genuinely puzzled, and her 
 host at once explained, 
 
 "I have in the wall of my library a patent contraption 
 which will make a record of anything said in the room, if 
 I should wish it to do so. I bought it several years ago, 
 but it has practically never been used — no need for it to be. 
 As it happened, however, it was turned on just before we 
 left for the convention. There was little talk in my library, 
 though, and the rolls were not used up. This morning I 
 discovered it was turned on, and that it made an aston- 
 ishingly good record of a conversation last evening between 
 John Smokas and me. May I put it on the machine, so you 
 may hear it? We said some things I'm quite anxious you 
 should hear, — but I'm sort of fearful whether I have the 
 courage to say them." 
 
 Mrs. Harney looked more mystified than ever, after this 
 explanation, but of course her curiosity was exceedingly 
 aroused, 
 
 "Please put on the record, Mr. Fenton. I'd like to hear 
 it." She had no inkling at all that it was to be the most 
 important conversation of her life. But with the first 
 recorded words, in a tone she had never heard Fenton use, 
 
 "Do you plan to marry Alice Harney?" — she sat up 
 as straight as a grenadier, and only with difficulty rescued 
 the Tibetan elephant from sliding to the floor. In spite 
 of her, she laughed a tiny bit at Smokas' naive remark that 
 Alice Harney was only ten years old. She still did not gain 
 the drift of the conversation while Smokas was defending 
 his chief's comparative youth. She now sat back, relaxed 
 from her first surprise, and Peter Fenton, watching her 
 from a chair near by, could see she was trying to visualize 
 the scene in the library. 
 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 81 
 
 When Peter, in his conversation with Smokas, struck 
 into the summary of his own biography, he found he could 
 no longer meet Mrs. Harney's honest, questioning eyes. 
 Was he going to wreck the whole matter, by this recording? 
 In tremendous anxiety, almost in prayer, he bowed his head 
 upon his clenched left hand. 
 
 "Alice Harney walked over to this desk," went on the 
 mechanical voice, very human in its intonations. Peter 
 Fenton felt he must take one look at this woman whom he 
 so much loved. But now it was she who was bent beneath 
 embarrassment — or what emotion was it? She had bowed 
 her head, and both hands were placed over her eyes. 
 
 On and on went the quiet voice, to its poignant recorded 
 question, 
 
 "John, what shall I do?" There was stillness, oh, very 
 breathless stillness in the elephant room, while Smokas was 
 doing his fire-poking of the night before. Then his voice 
 came in clearly, and he read the little poem. He gave his 
 little homily on truth, and Peter Fenton had not even 
 realized the night before what firm conviction there was in 
 John Smokas' voice, as he finished, 
 
 "I think I would let there be absolute truth between 
 you and Alice Harney, at the earliest possible moment." 
 Peter Fenton rose to stop the whirling machine, which had 
 given such a faithful reproduction of the recording. What 
 next? Was he to be slain or made alive forever? By this 
 time Mrs. Harney had hidden her face on the arm of the 
 divan. Was she crying quietly? Peter felt he would die 
 if he did not learn her reaction within a minute. He had 
 great faith in the power of human touch, that "laying on 
 of hands", which Bible times knew. 
 
 He bent over her and laid gentle hands on both of her 
 shoulders, 
 
82 YET 
 
 "My darling," he said; "My darling, look at me!" 
 
 She slowly raised her head. Even more slowly she raised 
 her eyes to meet his. They were not full of tears, they 
 were full of a great devotion. 
 
 "What is it?" — she whispered, — "that song we sing 
 in church, — the 'Magnificat'? — "My soul doth magnify the 
 Lord!' — Peter Fenton — I shall always feel this room is 
 holy." He knelt before her, and she lay her head upon his 
 shoulder. His arms were close around her, 
 
 "My darling, my darling," he murmured again, — and 
 there was no more need for words. 
 
 
 
Chapter XIX 
 
 Mrs. Reuben Fenton decided the next morning that 
 she would can peas. The tenant from one of her farms 
 had brought in a bushel of fine tender ones. So as a result 
 all of the household, including the two Harneys, took seats 
 out under the shady elms of the side yard, to hold a 
 shelling bee. 
 
 Peter Fenton drove by, with Willy. The car slowed a 
 bit and Mr. Fenton leaned out to shout, 
 
 "Need any help?" — and then was gone. Leona re- 
 marked a bit caustically, 
 
 "Now if that had been Dr. Smokas, the car would have 
 really stopped, and he would have had his hands in the 
 pea-pods by this time." Her mother answered her, 
 
 "Well, Leona, I suppose you know your Uncle Peter 
 has a great many more cares and responsibilities on his 
 hands than Dr. Smokas has. I think I'd rather hate to see a 
 President stop to shell peas." 
 
 "He's going to stop this afternoon, anyway," piped up 
 little Alice, "to take mother and me to the campus, to see 
 how Harney Hall is coming on. He wants mother to boss 
 it. He wrote her so, when we were in Medford. That's 
 why she hurried home." Mrs. Harney smiled, with decidedly 
 heightened color. Iona spoke at once, 
 
 "I think that's very proper of Uncle Peter, when the 
 hall is named for President Harney. She ought to have the 
 say about it. Everybody seems to be glad it is going to be 
 wide instead of high — there won't be any terrible fifth floor 
 to this one." Then fearing perhaps she had brought up too 
 sad memories, she said hurriedly, 
 
 "Mrs. Harney, you and President Harney didn't believe 
 in fraternities nor sororities, did you?" 
 
 83 
 
84 YET 
 
 Mrs. Harney looked down in surprise at the young girl, 
 seated at her side on a low stool, rapidly shelling peas. 
 
 "What makes you think that, my dear?" 
 
 "We-e-11, I've heard that neither of you belonged to a 
 Greek letter society, and while I did not know about you, 
 I had the distinct feeling that President Harney didn't ap- 
 prove — thought they were undemocratic. That was the 
 biggest influence in keeping Leona and me from accepting 
 bids." 
 
 "Oh, I didn't know that!" Mrs. Harney had genuine 
 distress in her voice. "You must not be influenced by me 
 at all. I attended a small denominational college, which 
 did not have chapters of sororities. But we had literary 
 societies, with fights and jealousies worse than any I have 
 observed between Greeks. O girls, — I surely hope you will 
 join this year. You will miss a great deal if you do not." 
 
 "But you haven't answered yet, about President Harney," 
 persisted Leona. "I'm pretty sure he would not have ap- 
 proved." Mrs. Harney hesitated, 
 
 "It's rather hard to put into words, but I think if we 
 could put the question to him, he would sincerely urge you 
 to join. There were strong chapters of fraternities in the 
 college where he took his undergraduate work, but with 
 his finances, he was unable to think of joining them. His 
 years were so full of struggle at that time that it is sad to 
 think of them." 
 
 "But there was something more," persisted Leona. 
 "Iona and I puzzled over it, but we could not understand. 
 It was some subtle bitter flavor that came out when he re- 
 ferred to fraternities. We decided that he felt they were 
 un-American." 
 
 "Oh, no," Mrs. Harney answered earnestly. "I feel it 
 was one of the disappointments of his rather hard life that 
 
 

 HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 85 
 
 he did not make a fraternity." — She added slowly, in a 
 lower tone, 
 
 "You girls were keen to notice that bitter flavor. I 
 admit it was there, but I feel sure he did not intend it 
 should be manifest. The bitterness, if we are to call it 
 such, was of long standing, and grew up in him from his 
 observation that if a poverty-stricken young man arrived at 
 college, and gave promise of fine athletic ability, it was 
 generally an 'open sesame' to a fraternity. While a bookish 
 student — unless there was something of the phenomenon 
 about him — did not gain those helping hands. Perhaps 
 he exaggerated, — but on the other hand, perhaps he 
 didn't." 
 
 "No, he didn't," Iona admitted in a low tone. Then 
 raising her head, and letting peas slide to the ground, she 
 demanded, 
 
 "Isn't it then precisely as I said? Aren't they undemo- 
 cratic? Didn't he disapprove of them? Weren't we on 
 the right track when we refused?" Mrs. Harney shook her 
 head, 
 
 "It isn't democracy at stake. Some of those athletes 
 were poorer than Mr. Harney ever dreamed of being — not 
 a cent to bring with them, and scarcely clothes for an 
 adequate college wardrobe. Yet some of them became 
 fraternity kings, in popularity. 
 
 "No, it's a matter of college standards — college values. 
 It's putting mind-achievements in the high place where they 
 should be, without, on the other hand, scorning athletic 
 prowess. The true ancient Greeks could seem to do it, as 
 I sometimes said to Mr. Harney. And the time is coming 
 when American colleges will. But your place for helping 
 in the change, girls, is inside the bars; not outside, criti- 
 sizing." 
 
86 YET 
 
 Iona and Leona looked at one another steadily. Their 
 keen minds were hard at work. Finally Iona said, 
 
 "Mrs. Harney — I don't know how to thank you for what 
 you've said. It will make a difference with all our college 
 years. You've put something straight for us that we had 
 simply despaired of ever getting straightened out. — We'll 
 join mother's chapter as soon as college opens this fall — 
 you know a second year student can do that. — Leona, Leona, 
 — I feel as though a weight was taken right off my back!" 
 
 At that moment Mrs. Fenton returned from a visit to 
 the canning scene in the house. Then she exclaimed, 
 
 "Iona, Iona! What have you been doing? You've 
 spilled two quarts of shelled peas on the ground. Lucky 
 it's nice grass and not dirt. Now get down and pick them 
 up and go straight in and wash them." 
 
 "Yes, mother," Iona said with such meekness that her 
 mother looked at her suspiciously. Mrs. Harney set her 
 own dish carefully on Iona's stool, and sprang up to help, 
 
 "I'm partly responsible, Mrs. Fenton. We were talking 
 so hard. I've heard of "spilling the beans', but it looks to 
 me as though 'spilling the peas' is worse." 
 
 Iona threw her arms around Mrs. Harney affectionately, 
 and planted a kiss on her cheek, 
 
 "This isn't 'worse' at all — it's glorious! — Mother, Mrs. 
 Harney has just made us over into angels, in that little 
 time you were in the house." 
 
 "Angels is as angels does," paraphrased their mother. 
 But her face wore a smile. Girls often have puzzling spots 
 in their lives, and she could see that Mrs. Harney had 
 helped them to clear up one. 
 
Chapter XX 
 
 The afternoon's viewing of the new Harney Hall was 
 as uneventful a procedure as had been the morning of 
 shelling peas — so far as all outward appearances went. It 
 was the first even small excursion that Peter Fenton and 
 Alice Harney had made together since the memorable 
 morning in the elephant room. Now there was an observant 
 Willy, seated in the driver's seat, and beside him a bubbling- 
 over little Alice, who turned to face the back seat every 
 other minute. 
 
 Harney Hall had been placed under construction at the 
 first minute the elements would permit, in the early spring, 
 and the building itself was now practically complete. As 
 Leona had said, this was wide, rather than high like the 
 former Lincoln hall. Shaped like the letter "E" — with the 
 two end sections extending back from the ends of the front 
 building, a semi-enclosed court was formed in the rear. 
 The dormitory proper made use of the entire first and 
 second stories of the "E", while a third story, to form a 
 recreation hall, appeared on the front section only. A large 
 number of boys could be accommodated, and most of the 
 latest developments in dormitory-building had been adopted. 
 Mrs. Harney thought as she viewed it what a tribute to 
 President Harney it formed, with its beauty and useful- 
 ness. She had no doubt at all about the source of much 
 of the fund which had built it. 
 
 Willy took the car to a spot of deep shade, and little 
 Alice was scampering about the campus, on her own in- 
 vestigating errands. By the imposing and yet hospitable 
 front door of the dormitory, Peter Fenton paused. 
 
 "This morning," he began, "I had a communication from 
 the city superintendent of schools, stating that the dean 
 
 87 
 
88- YET 
 
 of girls in the high school, for whom you so ably substituted 
 last spring, has made an unexpectedly fine recovery, and 
 desires to take up her work again this fall." Mrs. Harney 
 looked up startled, 
 
 "I had hardly given a thought to the fall; I suppose 
 taking for granted I should go on as before." 
 
 "Well, I had given much thought, for you, then, con- 
 cerning the fall. It seemed to me that work consumed too 
 much of your time and strength, and took you away too 
 much from little Alice." 
 
 "That last is surely true," Mrs. Harney said in a low 
 voice. The whole afternoon seemed to her a great deal 
 more exciting than merely looking at a new building 
 warranted. 
 
 "I began to make plans before ever an architect set 
 pencil to paper, and now here, at the right of the entrance, 
 across the hall from the executive office, where an assistant 
 dean of men will have his post, there is what seems to me 
 a rather charming suite of rooms — for the housemother of 
 Harney Hall. That was an office which didn't exist, when 
 old Lincoln hall was built, but in modern college thought, 
 it's quite important." 
 
 She caught his idea at once, and her eyes smiled — yet 
 something made her hesitate. He looked down at her, and 
 in the emptiness of the entrance hall, ventured to say in a 
 low tone, 
 
 "What is it, dear? Don't you like it? I had hoped you 
 would." She said slowly, without at all realizing what a 
 revealing statement she was making, 
 
 "I suppose it is because for ten years little Alice has 
 been the center of all my life and love and joy, that 
 instinctively I refer a new plan to the way it may affect 
 her. To grow up amid a horde of boys — I'm not sure even 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 89 
 
 the trustees would consider it proper." Peter Fenton threw 
 back his head and laughed so long and heartily that work- 
 men busy up on the second floor looked at one another, 
 chuckled and remarked, "Something must tickle the gover- 
 nor!" 
 
 Mrs. Harney looked up puzzled, 
 
 "What did I say that was funny?" 
 
 "My grandmother," Peter went on, "used to quote an 
 old story her grandmother brought out from New England. 
 It was to the effect that once a child was crying, and when 
 they asked her what was the matter, she said she was afraid 
 she should grow up and get married, and have a child ; 
 and that that child would crawl into the oven — you see 
 the story went away back to old brick-oven days — and get 
 burned to death! It was always called the peak of useless 
 worrying — but I'm not sure you haven't gone beyond. 
 
 "Think, dear," he said in a voice hardly above a 
 whisper, "June will come, after all the excitements of the 
 fall, and the decisions of the earlier spring. Please God, 
 then one of two large homes will be ready for little Alice ; 
 either possibly, the White House, or if not, the mansion 
 — with nary a horde of boys in either!" he ended, giving 
 his own contagious laugh again. 
 
 Mrs. Harney drew a long breath, and looked up into 
 his eyes, 
 
 "I must seem terribly stupid — but don't you see, I can't 
 seem to realize it at all." The tears rose in her eyes — "Just 
 that matter of Alice's education had always caused me so 
 much anxiety — perhaps not in just the few months after 
 we came here, — but before that, — there never seemed any 
 surplus. — O Mr. Fenton, — are you sure you realized what 
 a narrow-thinker I seem to be?" Because in any large 
 many-windowed and doored edifice, it is never impossible 
 
90 YET 
 
 but that someone has you in view, Peter Fenton restrained 
 himself with great difficulty from kissing away those two 
 tears. He did take her hand, to let his touch say just as 
 much as it could, — and drew her toward the right-hand 
 door, 
 
 "Lady, behold your fine and up-to-date New York apart- 
 ment!" he exclaimed with ceremony, as he ushered her in. 
 Alice just now came running through the hall, shouting, 
 "Mother!" and sentiment was decidedly at an end. 
 
 When Alice understood that this adorable chromium- 
 adorned, pink-plumbed Paradise was really for her mother 
 and herself in the fall, her delight knew no bounds, 
 
 "And you truly won't have to 'supervise noon hours' 
 — and be away where I can't get you, 'most all day? O 
 mother, mother — it's just too good to be true!" 
 
 "And we owe all of this kind planning to Mr. Fenton, 
 Alice," Mrs. Harney said quietly. The impetuous child, as 
 he bent down to her, flung her arms tightly around his 
 neck, 
 
 "O Mr. Fenton — I'll just love you forever, for planning 
 this for mother!" 
 
 "I hope you will, little dear," he said, with a touch of 
 solemnity in his tone that the child was quick to notice. 
 He gave her a light kiss upon the forehead. 
 
 That night when little Alice and her mother were 
 having one of their greatly prized bed-time talks, all at 
 once the child said, 
 
 "Why did Mr. Fenton sound just as if he were speaking 
 in church, this afternoon in Harney Hall, when he said 
 he hoped I would love him, mother?" Mrs. Harney paused, 
 to think just how to answer, and it satisfied herself as well 
 as the child when she said: "He's a man who says just 
 what he means, dear." 
 
Chapter XXI 
 
 "Let's play hookey, John!" Peter Fenton exclaimed one 
 hot morning in late August. He rose from his desk and 
 stretched his arms high above his head. 
 
 The "porch campaign" — theoretically quiet and simple 
 — had proved in practice to be rather strenuous. The 
 mansion was overrun with visitors, women as well as men, 
 at all hours. Women seemed to be taking more interest 
 in the presidential campaign this year than in any since 
 they gained the suffrage. Peter Fenton seemed to be their 
 exact ideal, and they came in hordes, anxious to discuss the 
 platform, and with great zeal for the state of the nation. 
 
 A favorite plan with the women, even more than the 
 men, was to arrive in a group, and ask Peter to take the 
 lead in a "panel discussion." — Privately he remarked to 
 Smokas, 
 
 "Do you know what I consider the other name for 
 Purgatory? It's 'panel discussion'. I wish I knew what man 
 invented it." 
 
 So this hot August morning he seemed to have reached 
 his limit. While the visitors had the freedom of the 
 mansion, yet he still kept to his rule of giving all din- 
 ners at the Illinois hotel. The house was seldom down to 
 family size for luncheons and breakfasts, and Peter felt this 
 was enough for Sarah and her staff. His special round table 
 was full every night, and often supplementary tables were 
 added to it. On the previous night the Fenton table had 
 extended the length of the hotel dining room. Smokas did 
 not blame him at all for wanting a few days of relief. 
 
 Both of them entered into quick preparations with 
 
 zest. They were to use a small light car, easy to take 
 
 ithrough wood roads. Willy knew where all camping equip- 
 
 I 91 
 
92 YET 
 
 ment was kept, and by mid-morning bedding rolls, fishing 
 tackle and an abundance of varied supplies were stowed in 
 the back of the car. Not a word was left behind for wires 
 or telephone messages, nor beyond, "a few days," any state- 
 ment as to the length of their absence. 
 
 "Feed 'em up, Sarah, — don't let 'em go away mad. The 
 hotel will give them dinners. But if I hear the word 'panel 
 discussion' again before I get some good north woods air 
 into me, I'll go off my nut!" Smokas grinned, 
 
 "To make you as slangy as that shows you're at the limit." 
 
 With the back of the car well packed, the two men 
 started ; John Smokas doing the driving. 
 
 "Go north, — get into the woods as soon as you can," 
 were all the orders from Peter. His only concession to 
 modern days was the excellent radio in the car. 
 
 "No newspapers, no books," was his order, "but once 
 in awhile we'll tune in and see if the U. S. is getting on all 
 right without us." He seemed to grow younger every hour. 
 Smokas wondered at the elasticity of the man, who had 
 now been under a strain for months. He told funny stories, 
 and warbled in a sort of tenor the songs that had been his 
 favorites years before. 
 
 "This is just making a new man of me!" he would 
 exclaim at intervals. Smokas knew pretty well the route 
 which it was best to take, and he skillfully avoided crossing 
 cities and large towns. Long before nightfall the air was 
 redolent with pine and fir wood, and the music of brooks 
 was in the air. 
 
 "Deeper yet into the woods! Deeper yet!" Peter would 
 exclaim, if Smokas turned a questioning eye as he saw some 
 grassy camp-site. Finally even Fenton was satisfied that they 
 were thoroughly out of sight and sound of civilization. 
 The radio was left to sit silently. 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 93 
 
 Smokas had never claimed to be much of a woodsman, 
 but Peter Fenton was in his element. Wearing old favorite 
 "roughing-it" clothes, he tackled camp tasks vigorously. 
 Dry wood was piled high for the fire, his stout hatchet 
 cut the green fir branches which would make them soft 
 fragrant mattresses at night, and his fishing skill coaxed a 
 bountiful mess of trout out of the brook. The men worked 
 together cooking a hearty supper. 
 
 "This is the life, John! This is the life, indeed," Peter 
 remarked, as they rested after their meal; sitting side by 
 side on a log, and watching the sparks from the fire fly 
 upward to the green trees. Fenton was too good a camper 
 not to have a sharp eye for his fire, in late August. 
 
 Smokas was just thinking how the firelight brought out 
 the strong, dignified features of the man beside him, just 
 as the rough camp clothes had seemed to magnify the fine 
 frame of his body. Smokas still, within himself, felt a bit 
 like the proverbial fish out of water, and admitted it was 
 city bright lights for his preference. All at once, without 
 previous connection, Peter said, 
 
 "My grandmother, Sarah Fenton, to whom I so often 
 refer, lived to be over ninety, but she kept her interest up 
 amazingly in matters concerning the government. She died 
 in mid-June, 1933. The day before she died she reached 
 over and clutched my hand, as I sat by her bed, 
 
 "Peter," she said earnestly, "the United States has gone 
 off the gold standard, and has recognized Russia — someway 
 I have no wish to stay alive any longer in a country like 
 that. But Peter — I lay a charge on you. Undo those things. 
 — I don't know how you'll do it — but remember, my boy, 
 I charge you!' I soothed her as best I could, but those were 
 the last connected words she ever said. She seemed to have 
 kept up to say that, then her life slipped from her." 
 
94 YET 
 
 "And so that, Mr. Fenton, was why you held out so 
 firmly at the convention, that there must be a gold standard 
 plank put into the platform — I remember thinking you 
 really seemed to be inspired when you were pleading for 
 it. You had many men against you when you began." 
 
 "You mean, — was I doing it for granny's sake? No; 
 not wholly, at any rate. I suppose her words were in the 
 back of my mind, but I have a strong conviction of my 
 own on the subject. Nothing will do the country more 
 good than to set our lazy gold at work." 
 
 "But how was it," Smokas said in a low voice, "that 
 you asked for no plank against Russia? That too was in 
 your grandmother's exhortation." 
 
 "We have to speak as the spirit moves us, John. There 
 is a wonderful story in the Bible about the destruction of 
 the wicked cities — and they would have been saved if only 
 a handful of good folk could be found." Peter reached over 
 and laid his hand on Smokas' knee. "You're an American 
 citizen, John, — as good as can be found. But also, so far 
 as I'm concerned, — you've saved Russia for me ! 
 
 "And now, to bed. The fire is dying down, and it will 
 be safe to leave it. Pleasant dreams — and no 'panel discus- 
 sions' in 'em!" 
 
 Peter Fenton was sound asleep in five minutes, but not 
 so with Smokas. He was not as much worn out as Fenton, 
 and to the man who is not born with a love for camping, 
 the great outdoors is not a soothing nurse. Finally he got 
 into the car and turned on the radio, closing the car 
 windows and keeping the tone low. He tuned in to the 
 capitol of this northern state, and presently a measured 
 voice was saying : 
 
 "This is the State Fire-warden's office. Warning to All 
 Campers! Warning to All Campers! You are urged to leave 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 95 
 
 the woods immediately on hearing this message. Pass it on 
 to other campers you meet. Two large forest fires are now 
 out of hand, and seem to be converging. This will close 
 many familiar wood roads. Do not Delay! Leave at Once! 
 Will repeat later." 
 
 John Smokas' mouth opened and his cheeks whitened. 
 He opened the car door and sniffed. There was indeed a 
 smell of smoke in the air, and the wind had freshened. 
 He went rapidly over to where Peter Fenton was lying so 
 comfortably on his fir boughs, wrapped in a blanket. 
 
 How he hated to waken him! Was it necessary? The 
 state capitol was a long way off — Ah, but it was the fire- 
 warden's office calling, wherever that might be! He decided 
 he must take no chances, and bent down to the sleeping 
 man, laying a hand on his shoulder, and saying quietly, 
 "Mr. Fenton, Mr. Fenton, Wake up!" 
 
 Peter Fenton came awake quietly, without being startled, 
 just saying, "What is it, John?" Smokas told him. Peter 
 groaned, and then laughed a little, 
 
 "Well, I've had one good dream, — and I'll warrant 
 that's more than you have. I'll drive for awhile, and per- 
 haps you can have a few naps in the car." Smokas realized 
 from his chief's lack of remonstrance that perhaps the 
 danger was more urgent than he had thought. Their pos- 
 sessions were not scattered. Using powerful flashlights 
 they could survey everything. Fenton poured buckets of 
 water from the brook on their fire, and they were ready for 
 the road in less than a half hour. Both men were rather 
 serious and disinclined to talk, as they drove through the 
 dark woods on the rutty, jolting roads. They did not say 
 so, but to both the smoke pall seemed heavier. 
 
 They had ridden steadily, although not very fast, be- 
 cause of the road's condition, for three hours. The clock 
 
96 YET 
 
 in the car marked two, in the morning — Napoleon's lowest 
 hour for courage. All at once Peter whistled. In front of 
 them the road divided into three clear paths; to left and 
 right and straight ahead. 
 
 "Do you remember this place when we came into the 
 woods?" Smokas shook his head, 
 
 "Whichever path we got here by, we just kept going 
 north by the one road ahead." 
 
 "Would common sense indicate that we keep the middle 
 road? — I'll bet one or more of these roads leads right to 
 fire." 
 
 "We made some turns and curves," Smokas said slowly. 
 "How ashamed I am not to remember!" 
 
 "It's the old wood-man who ought to be ashamed," 
 Fenton replied, sniffing the air, and trying to see if smoke 
 seemed thicker on either side. He had just decided he 
 would take the center path, when over at the left, clear to 
 both of them, though it seemed miles distant, there came 
 a call, 
 
 "PETER!— PETER!" 
 
 "Darned if that doesn't sound like Roxie!" Smokas mut- 
 tered — "Could it be somehow a sign? Elephants are mighty 
 lucky — and they come from India, where there are queerer 
 doings than we think." 
 
 Peter sat quietly for a moment. Then he said, 
 
 "It's a toss-up, at best. We'll take the left road." 
 
 It proved a wise choice. The road grew wider and more 
 travelled. Both presently remembered it as the way they 
 had entered the woods in the late afternoon. Before long 
 they met a through highway, and then the miles peeled off. 
 They stopped then for no questions, but later found out 
 the center and right paths would have led them into real 
 danger. 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 97 
 
 "Want to stop and go to bed for a few hours in one of 
 these towns?" Peter asked, but Smokas shook his head. He 
 even laughed a little, 
 
 "I never felt so responsible for a presidential candidate 
 as I do right now. I've the feeling that the quicker we see 
 Fentonia, the safer we'll be." 
 
 "Good old Sangamon," Fenton said, when they first 
 came in sight of the river. They were in camp clothes, and 
 both felt a bit foolish, as they came into the Illinois city 
 about nine in the morning. As they made a sharp turning 
 Smokas laughed out loud, 
 
 "I'll bet I know where you're going! You're heading 
 for the park to ask Roxie if she was up to anything in the 
 night." Peter grinned and didn't deny it. 
 
 Old Jim, the elephant's keeper was lounging against 
 the gate of Roxie's enclosure as they drove up, 
 
 "Hi, Jim!" Fenton called, "What are you watching 
 Roxie so hard for?" Jim turned with a start, 
 
 "I dunno — guess I felt sort o' uneasy, fear she might 
 be sick. Just two o'clock she woke me, yelling 'Peter' 
 twice; loud enough to raise the dead. First time she ever 
 did that. But she seems all right." 
 
 "She is, Jim," said Peter; "exactly all right." 
 
Chapter XXII 
 
 Time had crept or flown, just whichever you may 
 choose, until middle October had come. With late Septem- 
 ber, Cartwright college had opened, with a dean as acting 
 president. Harney Hall was full of boys, who seemed to 
 relish the innovation of a housemother, and gave a warm 
 welcome to Mrs. Harney, in her new post. Her first of- 
 ficial duty was to direct the proceedings at the large "open 
 house" gathering, held in the Hall, and her way of doing 
 this gained warm praise from faculty and towns-people. 
 
 At noon, on a day of chill drenching rain Peter Fenton 
 went to the kitchen of the mansion, in search of the house- 
 keeper, Sarah. 
 
 "How is it, Sarah," he said, "with the larder today? 
 Got any frying chickens? Got some good soup and salad? 
 There are no political visitors here for tonight, and I sort 
 of thought a dinner of own folks, right here at the mansion, 
 would taste good." 
 
 "Why, Mr. Peter, I've often and often thought one of 
 my plain dinners, with no French frills, would just do you 
 good. I'd love to see to it. Can ye give me a little idea 
 how many 'own folks' there'll be?" 
 
 "Well, I thought I'd send over for the Fenton twins 
 and their mother, and ask them to call for Mrs. Harney 
 and little Alice. Then John Smokas will be here, and his 
 cousin, Cleon Telucha. Isn't eight a pretty nice number, 
 Sarah? You know the Greeks told us to dine with not less 
 than the three Graces nor more than the nine Muses." 
 
 "Eight is a grand number, Mr. Peter — and I'll give 
 you a dinner that's Thanksgiving and Christmas all rolled 
 into one, — Say, is it any sort of famous day at all?" 
 
 Peter walked over to a calendar, 
 
 93 
 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 99 
 
 "Well, right you are, Sarah! I wasn't thinking of it 
 when we started planning, but this is 'Discovery Day' — 
 I'll say you and I ought to honor Christopher Columbus, 
 if anyone ever did! — There's that set of silver ships for 
 the table I bought in New Orleans — get 'em out, on a 
 mirror sea, — you'll know how to fix it, Sarah — Gracious, I 
 just remembered I haven't asked my guests yet!" 
 
 "They'll come — and runnin'!" Sarah declared. 
 
 That honored seven certainly did put aside any pos- 
 sible plans they might have made for the evening, for the 
 honor of being guests at the mansion on "Discovery Night." 
 "Let's dress formally," they passed the word around, and 
 they were delighted they had done so, when their host met 
 them in full dress, and there were orchid corsages for the 
 women and gardenias for the men, awaiting them in the 
 dressing rooms. Both little Alice and her mother were in 
 white. Their dresses had been made with careful elegance. 
 
 The twins hugged each other, when they reached the 
 top of the stairs, and Leona whispered, 
 
 "Oh, I think what I think! — Sis, see if you can't get 
 the truth out of John Smokas tonight." 
 
 "No such thing," Iona said firmly. "I love Uncle Peter. 
 I honor him for everything he does, and while there's no 
 law against our 'thinking what we think', as you said — 
 especially if we don't say so to anyone, yet I won't snoop 
 on Uncle — and don't you!" 
 
 The candle-lighted table, with its three silver ships of 
 Columbus sailing down the center, on a green-bordered 
 mirror sea, ending at both sides in shallow dishes of pink 
 and white pond-lilies — shipped from heaven knows where! 
 — was a sight to keep in memory. The political news that 
 had come in during the day had been steadily good, John 
 Smokas knew, but even that could not have accounted for 
 
100 YET 
 
 the peace and radiant happiness that illuminated Peter 
 Fenton's face, as he surveyed his board. Iona felt sure she 
 knew; "he has his own family at last," she thought to 
 herself, but she gave no outward word or significant look. 
 Even the unusual beauty of Mrs. Harney was not remarked 
 upon — each saw it, but good taste closed their lips. But 
 little Alice, at her first formal dinner, had to take some 
 mild teasing, such as, 
 
 "Well, Alice, — I'm surprised you didn't demand to have 
 Roxie for your escort! With a bushel or so of artichokes 
 at hand, she would have kept shouting 'Peter!' all evening." 
 
 This sally came from Telucha. Fenton turned to Smokas. 
 
 "Did you tell him?" 
 
 "No. It was so good I was afraid he couldn't keep it 
 out of the Tocsin — and it's really just for the Fenton clan." 
 
 "Let me in tonight, Mr. Fenton," Telucha said earnestly. 
 "Nothing shall be printed that you do not wish." 
 
 "Little Alice," Mr. Fenton said with a touch of solemnity 
 in his voice, "by a pretty good right, Roxie should have 
 been here tonight, for without her, things might have taken 
 a turn that would have prevented this dinner." 
 
 That story of the happenings in the north woods, which 
 both Peter and Smokas had agreed to keep to themselves 
 for a time, made as marvelous a dinner-story as was ever 
 told. Mr. Fenton added touches of wood-lore to it which 
 made it even seem new to Smokas, and the rest leaned 
 forward listening, almost without drawing a full breath. 
 Little Alice was the first to speak, 
 
 "O Roxie, Roxie, Roxie! — Mr. Fenton, couldn't she 
 have a gold ring around her tusk, to say she saved your 
 lives?" 
 
 "That's right!" grinned Smokas, "Let's put Roxie on 
 the gold standard!" This reference to the much-discussed 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 101 
 
 platform plank hit the funny spot of all, and broke the 
 tension of the tale. 
 
 They adjourned to the library. The ensemble had 
 departed, and the group had an amazingly homelike at- 
 mosphere about it. Willy had built up a fine fire, from 
 lumps of Illinois soft coal, interspersed with pitch-pine 
 fagots which made a glorious flame. 
 
 "This reminds me," said Telucha, "that our grate-fire 
 poet laureate has just had a most substantial triumph. I 
 haven't asked her if I may tell it, but I think she will allow 
 me." Everyone but the twins looked blank. lona's face 
 flamed, and she shook her head at him. But Leona laughed 
 softly and said, "Go on, Cleon." 
 
 Telucha looked around the circle of interested faces, 
 
 "About a year ago a young poet in this city brought 
 me some poems to print in the Tocsin. I was happy to do 
 this, but the poems kept getting better and better, and 
 finally I asked the poet if I might be her agent, and try to 
 sell them for her to magazines. She agreed, if I wouldn't 
 use her name. 
 
 "It seems this poet has a very famous uncle, and she 
 declared that to use the same name was just like trying to 
 make capital out of his glory. So it was our secret, and 
 two were printed that way — I rather think, Mr. Fenton, 
 you and Smokas saw them. But for this last one, I coaxed 
 till she consented to let the name be used. The magazine 
 which took it stands as a high criterion in the literary 
 world. — May I present Miss Iona Fenton, — whose poem, 
 'Dragon-Jaws,' will appear in the November Pacific 
 Monthly." 
 
 Everyone but Iona jumped to his feet and tried to 
 grab the young poet. Her mother was determined to em- 
 brace her — and apparently so were all of the rest! 
 
102 YET 
 
 "The Poem!" shouted Peter Fenton. "Somebody be 
 quick and read us that poem before we burst with pride 
 and anticipation!" 
 
 "I will read it — I'd be proud to, if the poet allows?" 
 Smokas said quietly. Iona smiled, rather tremulously, for 
 all of this ovation was entirely unexpected by her. As a 
 dramatic prelude, Dr. Smokas bent over the grate, tapped 
 vigorously with the poker on the side of a large lump of 
 black coal. It split and tongues of vivid flame poured out. 
 Then straightening, he read: 
 
 DRAGON-JAWS 
 
 There's a strange land in my burning grate, 
 There's music in the talking fire; 
 But strangest are the beasts that keep 
 Their lair in the flaming pyre. 
 
 See now, black dragons crouch and crawl, 
 
 A single, glowing eye they show; 
 
 I take the master's iron rod — 
 
 Firm they my sov' reign will shall know. 
 
 Their jaws are clenched, but I deny 
 Their right to say me, "Nay!" 
 See, see — I open up those jaws! 
 Such fire-tongues will play! 
 
 As the mellow voice of Smokas read the last words, 
 he bent to Iona and said, 
 
 "Stand up, little girl, — and take a bow!" — And the 
 family and friends closed in upon her again. It was a 
 triumph any girl would remember. 
 
 Then the mother looked at her wrist watch, and re- 
 membered all the various occupations of the morrow. She 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 103 
 
 began to gather the flock for North Fentonia. But Peter 
 Fenton had a final word, 
 
 "Friends, I think none of us has thought about it 
 tonight — and good riddance that we haven't — but this is 
 October 12, and on the 'Tuesday after the first Monday in 
 November' will come election night. 
 
 "There probably will not be much sleeping for any of 
 us that night, but I want you all to hear the news in as 
 much comfort as possible. There are two suites of rooms 
 up stairs, that go by the name of the 'Morning glory suite' 
 and the 'Apple Blossom' suite, from the way they are 
 decorated. The suites are side by side, and I now invite 
 the ladies of this evening to my election house-party. Mrs. 
 Fenton, with Iona and Leona, are invited to consider the 
 'morning glory' as their home, for that day and night, 
 and I hope Mrs. Harney and little Alice will consent to be 
 'apple blossoms' — how's that, little Alice?" 
 
 "I like that, Mr. Fenton — and I'd rather be an apple 
 blossom than a morning glory — they stay longer!" 
 
 And then she wondered why such a shout of laughter 
 went up, and so many smiling looks were cast that Mrs. 
 Harney and Peter Fenton were left with blazing cheeks. 
 
 
Chapter XXIII 
 
 "Confound it, Smokas," said Peter Fenton on the morn- 
 ing of election day, "there's a news photographer behind 
 every pillar of the porch, and in the corner of every room 
 — I even had to poke one out of my private dressing room. 
 And I can't step without falling over a press representative." 
 
 "I know they're a nuisance," Smokas said soothingly, 
 "but their jobs depend on how well they can stick around. 
 A lot of them, too, have been Fenton boosters at every 
 turn. Pretty good chaps." 
 
 Peter Fenton laughed aloud, — "It reminds me," he said, 
 "of the tale of the old lady who slept by the sea so many 
 years that later she had to hire someone to pound on her 
 door and imitate waves on rocks. Likely someday I'll be 
 lonesome enough to weep if there isn't a reporter at my 
 heels, — What on earth are those?" 
 
 Now it was Smokas' turn to laugh, 
 
 "Why, that's an idea of some enterprising dealer; I 
 didn't quite get it, whether he was local or down from 
 Chicago. He asked permission to put a tableful of his 
 portable radios in the hall, so anyone, going from room to 
 room, could just take one along and keep up with the 
 polls. Now don't you call that an election de luxe?" He 
 laughed again — the idea of travelling returns seeming to 
 amuse him immensely. 
 
 "By the way, sir, don't you want to get your own voting 
 over with pretty early? Do you want Willy to bring the 
 car?" 
 
 "Nonsense — the polling place for this ward is just two 
 blocks away, in Stuart's garage. Let's go." And without 
 another word, Peter Fenton put on his hat and started down 
 the steps. John Smokas reflected on how free his hero was 
 
 104 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 105 
 
 from petty vanity. One of the moments for which the 
 news-reel men had been lying in wait had come, for every 
 theater in the country would want to flash on its screen 
 the picture of the candidate casting his individual vote. But 
 Peter Fenton never thought to glance at a mirror, nor to 
 give a pull to his tie, to be sure it was straight. He was a 
 man, on a man's business, and that was enough for him. 
 If the cameras caught some pleasant smiles, they could have 
 caught them at the polls on every previous year of his 
 voting. He was precisely as usual on this morning of the 
 greatest day of his life. 
 
 A parade of "First Voters" had been arranged for ten 
 o'clock in the morning; each young voter first to have cast 
 his or her ballot, and then to meet at the courthouse and 
 to march past the mansion, led by the Cartwright college 
 band and under a huge banner that said: 
 
 WE'VE CAST OUR FIRST VOTE FOR PETER FENTON 
 
 Despite his friendly pauses for the news-reel men, 
 Peter Fenton and Smokas were back on the porch of the 
 mansion before the arrival of the "First Voters." 
 
 "Look who's there!" shouted Peter; "Now that's sen- 
 sible stuff for the news-reels — Ever see such pretty girls in 
 your life, Smokas?" And Smokas agreed solemnly that 
 indeed he never did. 
 
 Iona and Leona, the Fenton twins, had kept it a dark 
 secret that they had been asked to lead the "First Voters" 
 — wearing the traditional Goddess of Liberty dresses, and 
 carrying flags. The parade wound clock-wise around Peter, 
 as he stood on his lawn, and the reels clicked like busy 
 castanets. Large tables were being placed on the side lawn 
 of the mansion where refreshments would be freely served 
 to all who wished. The mills, and most of the city shops 
 
106 YET 
 
 took a holiday, and the large student body of Cartwright 
 college added to the throng. 
 
 All at once it was noon, on the Tuesday after the first 
 Monday of November. Whistles blew in Fentonia and 
 cannon boomed — as indeed they were likely to do all of 
 the rest of the day, at intervals. 
 
 "Mrs. Harney!" called the voice of Mrs. Reuben Fenton 
 on the telephone, "Don't you believe we'd better drive over 
 to the mansion? I'm afraid it's bedlam over there, and per- 
 haps we can help make life liveable for Peter. The twins 
 have been home long enough from the parade to become 
 girls rather than goddesses, — and as the saying is, they're 
 'rarin' to go' over where news is thickest. It'll be pretty ex- 
 citing for little Alice, but she'll be all right, with her mother 
 along. What say — shall we come for you?" 
 
 Mrs. Harney eagerly agreed ; indeed, she thought to 
 herself with a smile, "Wild horses would have hard work 
 keeping me away." Alice had a new blue dress for the 
 occasion, gay with red, white and blue campaign rosettes. 
 Mrs. Harney looked slender and distinguished, in a black 
 gown, trimmed with white. But she also pinned on a bright 
 "Fenton rosette," for a touch of color. 
 
 Not even the observant Smokas, nor reporter-minded 
 Telucha could have written an accurate history of that day's 
 life at the mansion. There were times when every soul 
 under the roof seemed to go hilariously crazy. 
 
 Every soul, that is, except the one whom Smokas pri- 
 vately called the "Rock of Gibraltar." Seated at his desk, 
 not denying for a moment that he was tremendously inter- 
 ested in the returns, but with some inner well of peace that 
 seemed to keep him marvelously above the hysteria which 
 threatened to swamp the rest of Fentonia, Peter Fenton was 
 a sheet-anchor for them all. 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 107 
 
 Peter Fenton had met Mrs. Reuben Fenton and her 
 party, on their noon arrival, as they reached the porch, 
 
 "I say, I do appreciate this — I can't tell how much. 
 Now I beg of you, don't get all worn out with the comings 
 and goings. Go to Sarah for sensible food and drink, and 
 take plenty of it. I have resolved to do that too, and you 
 set me a good example." Then by a marvelous bit of host's 
 legerdemain, he had sent them hither and yon, all but Mrs. 
 Harney. With a firm grasp of her hand, he swung her down 
 the private corridor to the elephant room, unlocked the door 
 — and there, for just a moment, the universe was their own. 
 
 Mrs. Harney could not remember afterward that she 
 had done one thing, but say "Peter — O Peter!" and lift her 
 lips for long kisses. But at the close of the long day and 
 night, when the fine calm and the consideration for others 
 on the part of the candidate had been telegraphed from 
 Puget Sound to Key West, Peter Fenton found a chance to 
 say to his lady-love, 
 
 "You seemed to give me such peace and serenity this 
 morning, in that little moment in the elephant room, that 
 the whole day became easy for me. With my love beside 
 me, why should I be afraid of any lions that might roar?" 
 
 He was the only calm one, however, in the city or the 
 county — perhaps, in the state or the nation. 
 
 "As Maine goes, so goes the country," is the old saying, 
 and Maine, voting early, rolled up her grand triumphant 
 reports in season to set a magnificent key-note for the 
 nation. Ward returns, city returns, county returns — and 
 finally, returns from states came over the patient wires and 
 through the uncharted lanes of the air. 
 
 Shades of the early November night began to draw 
 down. The Fentonia Municipal band, and the college band 
 had played spirited national airs and victory music until the 
 
108 YET 
 
 musicians had no more breath to blow. Even the city urchins 
 had stuffed so well with "hot dogs" and buns, at the long 
 tables on the Fenton lawn, that they sleepily went home 
 to bed. 
 
 The Tocsin-Times put out a joint extra at midnight, 
 with VICTORY FOR FENTON across the top of it, in 
 letters six inches tall. But it wasn't news, then, to a single 
 one who grabbed for a paper, in patriotism for the candi- 
 date. No sooner was the extra out, — which had been prom- 
 ised in the regular evening Tocsin edition, than with one 
 of those mass movements that psychologists study, the adult 
 population of Fentonia surged across Sangamon bridges, or 
 along the avenues — hurrying, hurrying to the mansion, and 
 shouting at intervals: 
 
 WE WANT PRESIDENT FENTON— PRES-I-DENT 
 FENTON! 
 
 And they had him! For hours he was theirs — theirs to 
 see, their President as no man had ever been before in Illi- 
 nois — son of their common soil, and boy and man who had 
 grown up with them. 
 
 Smokas was unconcealedly anxious that his chief be not 
 entirely worn out. Finally, at nearly three o'clock, in the 
 glare of great spot-lights and with a powerful public address 
 system to aid him, he declared, 
 
 "The opposing candidate has just telephoned his con- 
 gratulations to President Fenton — always the crowning 
 event of an election night. Now — let's all go home for 
 well earned rest!" 
 
 In ten minutes the lawns were clear, and faithful, proud 
 Willy turned off the last of the special outdoor lights. 
 
 President Peter Fenton was elected. 
 
Chapter XXIV 
 
 As a clock somewhere in the distance was striking eight, 
 Mrs. Reuben Fenton sat up in bed and surveyed her sur- 
 roundings. 
 
 "It's certainly something to remember," she said to her- 
 self, "to have slept a night in the White House." Across 
 the room from her was another bed, with the curly heads 
 of the twins lying rather close together on their pillows. 
 
 "Seems a shame to wake them," she meditated, "after 
 the ball and all, last night. But really, this house quieted 
 down amazingly fast last night. The twins have kept later 
 hours, many a time, in Fentonia." So she stepped out of bed 
 energetically, herself, to begin her own toilet, calling mean- 
 while, 
 
 "Twinnies, Twinnies, — wake up! It's past eight now, 
 and your Uncle Peter seemed to make a special point of it, 
 that there would be a 'family breakfast at nine.' — I just can't 
 help the feeling that something is going to happen." That 
 last was a very crafty remark, and of course it brought the 
 twins up sitting, sleepily demanding, 
 
 "What, Mother? What's going to happen?" 
 
 "Don't ask me — I surely wouldn't tell, if it had been 
 confided to me — and since it's only guess-work, from your 
 Uncle's manner, I have nothing at all to say." 
 
 ' 'Uncle's manner?' — O, O Leona, — do you suppose it's 
 going to be an engagement breakfast?" 
 
 "I don't know whom he thinks he's going to tell, if it 
 is," cynically remarked Leona. "Anyone to take two looks 
 at him, last night, would see that out of this universe, he 
 has eyes for just one woman. And as for her, I really be- 
 lieve she grew a whole inch yesterday, just in pride to see 
 her man inaugurated President of the United States. She 
 
 109 
 
110 YET 
 
 looked pretty nice, herself, — I'll say that for her. I never 
 knew blue eyes could sparkle so, and her cheeks were the 
 prettiest red — and not rouge, either! The papers say Uncle 
 is the handsomest man who was ever elected President, — 
 and maybe they will say she's the prettiest First Lady!" 
 
 The bath resounded with showers, and there was a great 
 scurrying around the bags which were so meagerly unpacked 
 the night before. 
 
 "She and little Alice will wear white, I'm pretty sure, — 
 let's make it a white breakfast! Mother, put on your white 
 suit; it's so becoming to you." All mothers are very re- 
 sponsive to daughter-flattery, so a group of white-clad Illi- 
 nois folk was ready in short order. 
 
 "Do we wear hats, as we would in a hotel?" Leona said 
 doubtfully, but her mother was clear on the point, 
 
 "Certainly not, girls. This is now your Uncle Peter's 
 home, for the next four years. I'm a little doubtful about 
 all this white, in January. — Now in the old days of March 
 4th inaugurations, often it was exceedingly springy. Then, 
 again, it wasn't," she added in honesty. "Your father and I 
 once went to Washington in March, and it was wretchedly 
 cold and wet. Yesterday was one of those perfect days that 
 January sometimes has — and today is mild." 
 
 Peter Fenton, a smiling host, directed their way to a 
 small dining room — and Leona and Iona squeezed each 
 other's hands to see that he was wearing white — the attire 
 that was really most becoming to him, and that he preferred 
 above all other wear. 
 
 "Well, well," declared Smokas — "this seems almost like 
 Fentonia!" — as he looked around the table at the familiar 
 faces. Mrs. Harney's Medford cousins, from Massachusetts, 
 with whom she had spent the weeks immediately preceding 
 the inauguration, were added to the mid-westerners, but the 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 111 
 
 parents were among those who easily make friends, and the 
 two children were so spontaneous and vigorous that there 
 was no ice-breaking to do. 
 
 Mrs. Harney had awakened her little girl that morn- 
 ing, just as Mrs. Reuben Fenton had called the twins. 
 But Mrs. Harney had much more upon her mind. It is 
 so difficult to foresee a child's reactions. What if she were 
 suddenly to hear a secret at the breakfast table, and should 
 burst into tears? There was no reason why she should 
 — and yet, after all, didn't she have a right to special 
 telling ? 
 
 Alice wakened in a mood of much glee, 
 
 "A nice man told me last night he thinks there are as 
 many as twenty cats, around the White House — some wild 
 ones, but some, just nice pet-kitties. He said he'd find me 
 some, after breakfast. — S'pose I'd better wear a white dress, 
 if I'm going to hold cats?" 
 
 "I believe we'll both wear white, dear. All of mother's 
 dresses are black or white, and I don't feel like a black dress 
 this morning." 
 
 "And you and I must match — 'course we must. I'll try 
 to pick clean cats, that haven't been in coal cellars." 
 
 "Alice — " said her mother, and stopped for breath. 
 
 "Yes, mother dear — did you want something?" 
 
 "Do you remember that day in Fentonia, when you 
 hugged Mr. Fenton and told him you were 'going to love 
 him forever?' " 
 
 "Yes — he talked just like church, after I said it." 
 
 "Well, dear, — that was because he felt so deeply what 
 he said. — I want to tell you first of all that this morning at 
 the breakfast table Mr. Fenton is going to tell the friends 
 there that he has learned to love you and me, and wants us 
 to live with him always. Unless plans change, he and I will 
 
112 YET 
 
 be married in June." — It was said, and she almost held her 
 breath to see how Alice would take it. 
 
 The child was sober for a minute, then her eyes began 
 to shine, 
 
 "O mother, mother — he'll take such good care of you! 
 I've heard Sarah and Willy, at the mansion, say that Mr. 
 Fenton is good to every soul, and every dog — and every 
 stray cat that ever came in his way." — Then, with one of a 
 child's quick changes, reminded by one of her own words, 
 she began to jump up and down, 
 
 "And so I can live in the White House, with the twenty 
 cats — and out in Fentonia, with all those many elephants — 
 and dear Roxie will maybe be a piece mine! Oh-h-h-h 
 BOY!" 
 
 Mrs. Harney's hard deed was done, and really pretty 
 well done, as child psychology goes. Hand in hand, with 
 smiling faces, they started out for the breakfast room, the 
 route to which, in the complicated White House, having 
 been pointed out the night before. 
 
 Peter Fenton placed Mrs. Harney at his right. Alice, 
 with her shining eyes, sat down contentedly between the 
 Medford cousins. There was a strange, rich fragrance all 
 through the breakfast room, and those who noticed it 
 readily traced it to the flowers which filled a large low bowl 
 in the center of the table. Nobody felt to speak of them 
 till the elder Medford child said simply, 
 
 "What are those posies, Mother, in the center bowl?" 
 
 The child's mother looked at Mr. Fenton, and he smiled 
 in return, rising slowly from his chair, 
 
 "I've been rather hoping someone would ask a question 
 like that, and I'd make it a text for a few remarks, — as these 
 preachers say," and he nodded to the Fentonia rector, the 
 Rev. Wallace Brooks, seated at one side of the table. 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 113 
 
 "Laddie, — those are pretty special posies; they're orange 
 blossoms, with Florida dew still on them. They came in 
 by plane this morning before you were awake. I sent for 
 them because more than anything else I can think of, they 
 mean a wedding to me." 
 
 Mrs. Harney's hand was near his, on the table, and now, 
 with a smile into her blue eyes, he took it in his grasp, 
 
 "Friends, this beautiful lady beside me has given her 
 consent that I should tell you we will all meet again in 
 June, when, God willing, she will become my wife." 
 
 He sat down, but everyone else at the table but the 
 children immediately rose; the men, to grasp the Presi- 
 dent's hand, and the women, to kiss Mrs. Harney. 
 
 "Why don't you go kiss your mother, Alice?" demanded 
 the frank Medford cousin. Alice, with dignity, but in truth 
 too excited to be grammatical, replied, 
 
 "I was telled first of all, and mother likes my kisses 
 all by themselves — not mixy!" A shout of laughter rose, 
 and every last breath of formality was blown away. The 
 rest of the meal was a happy family breakfast. 
 
 Underneath the gaity, however, both Smokas and Tel- 
 ucha were busy composing the quiet publicity for the press 
 associations. Telucha had the last word, when he grasped 
 President Fenton's hand and said, 
 
 "Thank God this is a scoop for the Evening Tocsin!" 
 
Chapter XXV 
 
 Quaint old Plymouth, Massachusetts, lay serene in the 
 early hours of one of those rare June days which the poet, 
 James Russell Lowell, so well described. 
 
 Two men came out of the front door of a hotel, looked 
 up and down the Main street of the town, and then started 
 on a brisk walk together. They went to the Town Square, 
 and then began the steep climb up Burial Hill. 
 
 "Smokas, I was thinking, as we walked along," remarked 
 the elder man, "that an excursion like ours this morning 
 would have been a great pleasure to Abraham Lincoln. 
 You will remember that sign we saw, twenty five miles 
 or so back nearer Boston, at Hingham, that the direct an- 
 cestry of Lincoln, seven generations back, lived and were 
 buried in that town. I've even heard it said that Lincoln 
 himself didn't know the facts about his New England an- 
 cestry." 
 
 "He seemed to get along all right without knowing it, 
 Mr. Fenton." The President laughed a little, 
 
 "Do you maybe think I make too much of that first 
 Peter? I don't mean to — indeed that's why I suggested 
 we steal a march on the secret service men; just to be 
 sure we were not making copy from the ancestors." 
 
 "They'll know about him, all right." 
 
 "See here, Smokas — what's the matter? You don't 
 sound like yourself. Don't you feel well?" Then it was 
 Smokas's turn to laugh, 
 
 "Sure — I feel fine. But you don't have to worry much 
 about the details of a Presidential wedding, and I do. 
 Won't I say 'Thank Heaven!' when it's all done, and we 
 start the tour!" Then President Fenton gave one of his 
 characteristic laughs, 
 
 114 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 115 
 
 "Now note what you said just then, 'we start the 
 tour.' It isn't every young man who gets a chance to go 
 on a bridal tour not his own." 
 
 "Oh, I appreciate that — maybe I'm just anxious that 
 there shall be no hitch about the car getting here. I was 
 wondering if we tried too hard to have everything just 
 click. — And yet, if we had brought them a day earlier, 
 the word would have got around, and half the Atlantic 
 coast would have piled into Plymouth." 
 
 "Things will click all right, John. Keep your faith in 
 elephant good luck. — Man, what a view!" He had turned 
 midway up the hill, and looked off across the blue waters 
 of Cape Cod Bay, and even farther, to the Atlantic ocean. 
 Down towards the water front was the Greek portico 
 erected over Plymouth Rock in 1920, by the Colonial 
 Dames, to commemorate the 300th anniversary of the land- 
 ing. 
 
 "The old Rock monument, that had stone shells on the 
 top of it, was here when I saw the place last. I remember 
 I put my shoe-toe through the iron railing 'round the 
 Rock — just to get a bit of feeling I had 'landed,' I reckon." 
 
 "You've landed, Mr. President." 
 
 "Smokas — what did I say to you about that 'President' 
 business, between you and me? You surely are upset today. 
 Wait till Mrs. Reuben Fenton and the twins — or maybe 
 Telucha — get hold of you, and you'll feel better. — Well, 
 here we are at the church! The cars will need good brakes 
 this afternoon. It's probably locked — Say, it isn't! Let's 
 go in." 
 
 The quiet Puritanic interior of First church had a 
 sobering effect upon both. It was not of the denomination 
 to which either man belonged, but the edifice had been 
 most willingly loaned for the nuptials of the President of 
 
116 YET 
 
 the United States. His own rector, the Rev. Wallace 
 Brooks, from Fentonia, would officiate in the familiar serv- 
 ice. Without a word, both men walked down to the altar, 
 stood a moment in the golden silence as the morning sun 
 poured through the church windows, and then retraced their 
 steps. At the door Peter Fenton held out his hand to 
 Smokas, 
 
 "No younger brother could have stood by me more 
 faithfully than you. Remember, 'the elephant never for- 
 gets.' " He was bound to keep the day on a cheerful tone, 
 and was smiling as they climbed the considerable flight of 
 steps, added in later days for convenience in reaching the 
 burial ground. Here all was familiar, and he went at 
 once over to the south wall, for the location of his an- 
 cestor's grave. 
 
 Slowly he read the disintegrating letters aloud, as he 
 had done once, months before, from the photograph in his 
 study : 
 
 CAPTAIN PETER FENTON WHO 
 LIES BURIED HERE FOUGHT FOR 
 HIS COUNTRY IN THE REVOLUTION 
 AND YET HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 
 
 1783 
 
 "Antiquarians have told me, Smokas, that perhaps 
 some of his relatives, especially the one who prepared 
 the epitaph, had taken the Tory side, for the King, in 
 1776. That would be a reason for this defense." 
 
 "I'd like to write a postscript to that monument," 
 Smokas said, half angrily. "I'd say, 
 
 ANCESTOR OF THE FINEST GENTLEMAN 
 THESE UNITED STATES HAVE SEEN— so there 
 now!" 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 117 
 
 "Thank you, Smokas. I don't deserve that, but it some- 
 how sounds good to me, for I had a spell of wondering 
 just what gentleman,' in the 1783 sense, meant, and if I 
 qualified." 
 
 Fenton pulled out his watch and gave an exclamation, 
 
 "It's up to us to be stepping lively, get us some break- 
 fast at the hotel, and then be over at the station when the 
 Boston express comes in, with the 'Fentonia' private car 
 hitched on. I'm going to relish the looks of those secret 
 service men as we come down the street. I won't run 
 out on them often, but it does seem as though a man might 
 be pardoned a few shortcomings, on his wedding day." 
 
 As they sat together at breakfast with a few curiosity 
 seekers clustering around doors and windows, Smokas 
 said, 
 
 "Tell me again just the facts about the 'Fentonia.' It will 
 have to figure in the publicity." 
 
 "Not really much to tell," President Fenton said. "It's 
 a private car, with two special compartments, and several 
 berths. One end is a sitting room, convertible into a dining 
 room. Granny gave it to me — I'd never have thought of 
 buying it for myself. But she liked to travel about, and 
 yet disliked changing cars and being hustled. She went east 
 several times in the 'Fentonia.' Since her death it's been 
 kept in storage at the Bloomington railway yards, till I 
 told them a month ago to put it into commission." 
 
 "And you won't tell me yet where you're going on the 
 wedding journey?" 
 
 "Not yet, my boy. Doesn't the bridal couple often 
 keep that a secret till the last? You see I'm bound to carry 
 out everything in the traditional way." It came to Smokas 
 almost with the effect of a blow, that for once in his life 
 he saw a genuinely happy man — and that man had the 
 
118 YET 
 
 responsibility of the whole United States of America on 
 his shoulders! 
 
 Duly accompanied by a secret service group, and this 
 time with several automobiles, Fenton and Smokas went 
 to the railroad station immediately after breakfast. On the 
 back seat of the Fenton car lay an arm bouquet of choice 
 pink roses, to greet Mrs. Harney, and a willow basket con- 
 taining a small and very contented Persian kitten for little 
 Alice. 
 
 The train whistled from the northwest. Peter Fenton 
 clenched his hands until the knuckles grew white. And 
 then the train rolled in — the private car "Fentonia" shining 
 as though it had that day left the shops. 
 
 Out of other cars swarmed news-reel men and press 
 representatives. The Medford relatives had joined the 
 "Fentonia" when it reached Boston. Peace and privacy 
 were gone, for this day, but Peter Fenton foresaw other 
 days ahead. 
 
 An entire floor of the hotel had been taken for the 
 party. The wedding would be at four o'clock in the gray 
 church on the hill. The hotel had a special banquet room 
 where the wedding dinner would be served, — and then the 
 mysterious tour would start. Most of the United States, 
 by this time, was intensely curious about the direction of 
 that tour. 
 
 One newspaper woman, especially enterprising, suc- 
 ceeded in cornering Mrs. Harney in a corridor, 
 
 "Oh, it would mean so much to me if I could get a 
 scoop about your tour," she said, almost tearfully. Mrs. 
 Harney smiled, 
 
 "I'm sorry, but President Fenton has kept his pleasant 
 secret all these months. I'll truly tell you all I know. The 
 trip will be made in the car 'Fentonia.' There are two 
 
HE WAS A GENTLEMAN 119 
 
 compartments, and one will be occupied by President 
 Fenton's nieces, the Misses Iona and Leona Fenton, and my 
 little daughter Alice. We were warned to take all weights 
 of clothing — so that sounds like differing localities — or 
 maybe President Fenton was thinking of American weather, 
 and didn't want his assorted company to catch cold!" Her 
 pretty laugh rang out, and the disappointed reporter had to 
 smile in spite of herself. 
 
 After all, the solemn vows of a wedding service are 
 its main parts, whether for a President and his bride, or 
 for the simplest couple. 
 
 Owing to the meticulous care of Smokas for details, 
 every appointment of the wedding was perfect, and .there 
 was no hitch anywhere. The girl reporter, already won 
 to Mrs. Harney in the morning, nearly wrote poetry about 
 the bridal gown and flowers. 
 
 Mrs. Harney's grandmother's bridal gown, of beautiful 
 old-time silk, in the softest light dove-gray, had been care- 
 fully preserved. It was of the era which "Gone With the 
 Wind" heroines had made so much admired in the country. 
 It fitted Mrs. Harney's slender form without a change, and 
 seemed as if created for the Plymouth church, upon the 
 hill. She had a wish for flowers of a certain kind — and 
 Peter Fenton had moved heaven and earth, in other words, 
 had had New Hampshire and northern Vermont ransacked 
 for them. After all, there were not so many in her colonial 
 bouquet — but the fragrance! For she had wished for the 
 real, historic "Mayflowers" — the "trailing arbutus," of mod- 
 ern days. The harp music, too, of the ceremony, was played 
 at Mrs. Harney's wish. 
 
 The dinner came, and toward its close President Fen- 
 ton rose, much as he had done at that first breakfast in the 
 White House, after inauguration. 
 
120 YET 
 
 "Friends," he said, with his quiet smile, "the 'Fentonia' 
 car is going to start tonight on the longest trip it has ever 
 made, and the concluding date of the trip is not quite 
 certain. 
 
 "I was quoted in the press before election, — and truth- 
 fully — that I would not "swing around the circle,' as it is 
 called. But I did not mean at that time that I would never 
 travel east and west and north and south through our glo- 
 rious country. Indeed, if matters worked out, as they have 
 done, I fully intended to do this. 
 
 "The idea, though, of combining this with a wedding 
 journey, I confess, was not in my mind at that time — I don't 
 suppose, either, that I thought of bringing out the 'Fen- 
 tonia.' 
 
 "But one day I sent for my good friend Clooney, of 
 Bloomington, who has been my fairy godfather for trip 
 arranging for years, and told him I wondered if it would be 
 possible to shuttle back and forth, with practically no 
 doubling on our track, and visit every state in the Union. 
 
 "Mrs. Fenton and I hope to pay our respects to every 
 governor and his wife — if he's fortunate to have one — in 
 this great country. I regard, as you well know, those 48 
 governors as the key men in our land. Mr. Clooney has 
 worked out a marvelous schedule — we'll be back in Wash- 
 ington sooner than you might think. 
 
 "John Smokas and Cleon Telucha will be with us — 
 and Uncle Sam insists upon secret service men — who I've 
 found since January are grand chaps. 
 
 "We might have re-christened the 'Fentonia' as the 
 'Mayflower,' in honor of Plymouth Rock — but after all, the 
 Mayflower went back to England — and thank God, we 
 stay here!" 
 
Yet He Was A Gentleman 
 
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