Part 17

He stared straight into the eyes of the girl and once more received from her that frank and wondering gaze which had touched him so strangely when he had seen her first on the broad highway. His face was white under the tan. His hands trembled as he replaced his hat. In his heart he was saying farewell to her and his eyes expressed some of his emotion.

“You may take your own time, sir,” said the girl. “This gentleman and I have finished our conversation.” She passed Farr, looking him up and down with increasing curiosity and dawning recognition, and when her escort called to her impatiently, she caught her skirts around her and ran toward the glade where the others of the party were chattering over their hampers.

The lover started away slowly and sullenly on her trail, with only a glance at this blundering stranger.

“No, they do not sing serenades under windows any more--nor has the stone age returned with its love-making manners,” remarked Farr, his lips trembling and his emotion still in his eyes. “There are some manners which were worse, however, than knocking maidens down with clubs.”

The other man snapped himself around on his heels.

“Damn you, you're that fresh hobo! I don't forget a man who shoots off low-down sneers at me. Here! You come back here! I want to ask a few questions, my man.”

Farr continued on his way, opening his book.

“If I ever see you again--” blustered the lover.

“I sincerely hope that will never happen,” remarked the stranger, without turning his head. “Instinct of the purely animal sort tells me that if our paths cross in this life it will be very bad for one or the other.”

When Farr was in the highway he fumbled in his pocket and found the withered rose. He tossed it away among the roadside bushes.

But after he had gone on his way for some distance he retraced his steps and hunted in the bushes for a long time on his hands and knees until he found the poor little keepsake.

He put it carefully into the deepest pocket he could find in his newly acquired habiliments and trudged on down the world.

A MAN ON FOOT AND A MAN IN HIS CHARIOT

A blatant orator, haranguing passionately, attracted two new auditors.

A tall young man sauntered to the edge of the little group in the square and listened with a smile which indicated cynical half-interest.

An automobile halted on the opposite side of the group. A big man sat alone in the tonneau.

He began to scowl as he listened.

The young man continued to smile.

The big man was plainly a personality. He was cool and crisp in summer flannels--as immaculate as the accoutrements of his car.

In face and physique the young man was plainly not of that herd near which he stood.

His glance crossed that of the man in the car; he met the scowl with his smile.

Like a kiln open to the hot glare from a brassy sky or an oven where the July caloric blazed like a blast from the open mouth of a retort--such that day seemed Moosac Square in the heart of the cotton-mill city. High buildings closed in its treeless, ill-paved, dirty area. The air, made blistering by the torch of the sun, beat back and forth between the buildings in shimmering waves.

In the center of the square the blatant orator balanced himself on a stone trough which was arid and dust-choked. He harangued the group of unkempt men; sweating, blinking, apathetic men; slouchy men; men who were ticketed in attire and demeanor with all the squalid marks of idlers, vagrants, and the unemployed.

The man on the trough was of the ilk of the men who surrounded him. His face was flaming with the heat and with his vocal efforts. Perspiration streamed into his eyes, his voice was hoarse with shouting, but he had the natural eloquence of the demagogue. He was delivering the creed of the propaganda of rebellious poverty, the complaints of the dissatisfied, the demands of the idle agitators. He spiked his diatribe with threats flavored by anarchy. He pointed to policemen who had taken refuge in strips of shade which had been cast grudgingly by the high buildings. He reminded his hearers that those policemen had just driven them out of the tree-shaded parks. There the selfish rich folks were loafing under the trees. Poor folks were herded down the street and were forced to hold this meeting in that Gehenna, so he averred.

The man in the automobile muttered impatient words. Then he shouted, breaking in on the impassioned anathema which the orator addressed to the rich: “Stop lying to these men--stirring them up. The parks are for the people. You can go there--all you men can go there--if you'll go without making a disturbance.”

“If men in these days open their mouths to speak for their human rights it's a disturbance,” retorted the demagogue. “If we go up to the park and sit there and tremble like rabbits you rich men will let us stay there--perhaps! But we don't have as many rights there as the rabbits, for the rabbits are allowed to step on the grass.”

“You've got to obey the law like other citizens--you will not be allowed to disturb decent and respectable people. You and men like you must stop putting foolish notions in the heads of loafers in this city.”

“Then put something into our mouths--give us food. Why are we loafers?”