they walked briskly down the sloping street under the railroad bridge and then up the little hill whereon sits the capitol of illinois. they could see the big flag high up on the dome standing out in the prairie wind, and the little flags on the house wing and the senate wing whipping joyously, sprightly symbols of the sitting of both houses.
now and then they heard cheers from the house wing, where the legislative riot that ends a session was already beginning. they passed into the dark and cool corridors of the state house, then up to the third floor, where members and messenger-boys, correspondents and page-boys, rushed always across from one house to the other, swinging hurriedly around the brass railing of the rotunda. it seemed that the tide of legislative life was just then setting in toward the senate.
“oh, morley,” whispered amelia, forgetting his offense, and clinging close to him, “i can’t go in there, really i can’t.”
“nonsense,” said vernon, “come on. i’ll deliver you to mrs. hodge-lathrop in a minute; then you’ll be perfectly safe. besides, you have your lobbying to do.”
they reached the senate entrance, and the doorkeeper, seeing a senator, opened a way through the crowd for their passage. there was confusion everywhere, the nervous and excited hum of voices from the floor, from the vestibule, from the galleries, from all around. and just as they stepped up to the raised floor whereon the desks of senators are placed, the gavel fell, and stillness with it. they saw the lieutenant-governor leaning over his desk, studying a slip of paper he held in his hand.
“on this question,” he said, “the yeas are thirty and the nays are seventeen; and two-thirds of the members-elect having failed to vote in the affirmative, the resolution is lost.”
vernon stood transfixed. the whole thing was borne in upon him; he saw mrs. overman hodge-lathrop, and the expression of calm and lofty satisfaction that had settled on her face told him that it was the ames amendment that had been lost. but some new thought seemed to strike her, for when senator porter looked around with something like a smile of congratulation, she beckoned him, and he hastened to her side.
“move to reconsider and to lay on the table,” she said, and with a look of admiration he turned and made the motion. it was put, it was carried of course, and the amendment was lost irrevocably.
“well, that’s attended to,” said mrs. overman hodge-lathrop. “ah, morley,” she said calmly, “you here? and amelia?”
“she’s here,” he said, “and i—i didn’t get here on time!” the shame and mortification on his face were pitiable, though they could not have touched mrs. overman hodge-lathrop’s heart.
“and i didn’t get here on time,” he repeated ruefully.
“why, my dear boy,” said mrs. overman hodge-lathrop, “i didn’t intend that you should.”
he looked at her fiercely, angrily, a second.
“so that was the game, was it?” he said. he whirled, with another fierce look, on amelia.
“that was the game, yes, morley,” said mrs. overman hodge-lathrop, “but you needn’t look at amelia so—she was utterly innocent, the dear little thing.”
amelia came up. she had seen vernon’s expression.
“what is it—what has happened?” she inquired.
“well, i got here too late, that’s all,” said vernon. “i was detained, and mrs. hodge-lathrop has just now kindly told me that she had arranged that i should be. i’m ruined, that’s all; i’m lost.”
“no, morley,” said mrs. hodge-lathrop, “you’re saved. you’re saved from yourself.” she still smiled at him sweetly. “you might have made, don’t you know, another one of your speeches.”
vernon bit his lip and walked away. he encountered martin, but could only look at him helplessly. martin returned his look with one of surprise.
“you here?” he said.
“well, yes,” replied vernon. “at last—too late, it seems.”
the surprise had not left martin’s face; to it was now added a perplexity.
“if we’d known,” said martin; “but we thought, that is, we heard, that you had ducked.”
vernon shook his head as with a pain that would not let him speak. he was looking disconsolately across the chamber to where miss greene stood talking with bull burns. as in a dream, he heard mrs. overman hodge-lathrop exclaim:
“ah, there is that greene woman!”
mrs. overman hodge-lathrop was lifting her gold glasses again. vernon was wondering how he was to face the greene woman. but at mrs. overman hodge-lathrop’s words an idea came to him.
“i’ll go bring her and introduce her,” he said. he bolted away and went toward her. she was cold and distant. fortunately, burns fled at his approach.
“can you forgive me?” he said. “i’ll explain it all in an instant.”
“and how?” she asked with a chill rise in her tone.
“have you ever met mrs. overman hodge-lathrop?” he asked significantly.
“no,” she answered.
“then permit me,” he said. she went with him. mrs. overman hodge-lathrop had withdrawn her delegation to the rear of the chamber, and there awaited vernon’s return.
“mrs. overman hodge-lathrop, permit me to present miss greene; miss ansley, miss greene.” and so on, in the order of relative rank, he introduced her to the other ladies.
mrs. overman hodge-lathrop extended her hand officially. miss greene took it with a smile.
“i am very glad,” she said, “to meet mrs.—mrs.—ah, pardon me, but what was the name?”
“mrs. overman hodge-lathrop,” vernon said.
“ah, mrs. lathrop.”
mrs. overman hodge-lathrop seemed, to the eye, to swell.
“you have a charming little city here, mrs. lathrop. we poor chicagoans love to get down into the country once in a while, you know.”
mrs. overman hodge-lathrop reared back a little.
“no doubt,” she stammered. “i have always found it so.”
miss greene feigned surprise, and affected a look of perplexity. vernon withdrew a step, and with his chin in his hand looked on out of eyes that gloated. the other women in the party exchanged glances of horror and wrath. mrs. barbourton, for her part, seemed unable to endure it.
“mrs. overman hodge-lathrop lives in chicago,” she interjected.
“oh!” cried miss greene. “is it possible? how very strange that one could live in the city all one’s life and yet not have heard!”
“not so very strange, i fancy,” said mrs. overman hodge-lathrop. “one’s circle is apt to be so far removed.”
“yes?” said miss greene, with that rising inflection. “then you can not have lived in chicago long?”
“all my life,” snapped mrs. overman hodge-lathrop.
“so long as that!” said miss greene with eyes that stared incredibility. mrs. overman hodge-lathrop actually colored.
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“you are enjoying your visit to springfield, i trust? you have seen the lincoln monument and the homestead? how very interesting they must be! and the legislature offers novelty; don’t you find it so?” she gathered her skirts as if to withdraw. but mrs. overman hodge-lathrop achieved a smile.
“we have not enjoyed the pleasures of sight-seeing. on the contrary, we came to appear before the senate,” she said.
miss greene surveyed her critically, with that look in which one woman inspects another woman’s attire. she then extended her critical scrutiny to the dress of the others.
“to be sure!” she said, “i should have known.”
the ladies again exchanged glances. mrs. barbourton plainly could not bear that their position should be equivocal. she doubtless had her little vainglorious wish to have their success known.
“mrs. overman hodge-lathrop came down to appear in opposition to the woman’s-rights resolution!” she emphasized the word woman as if she would not for worlds have been a woman herself.
“indeed!” exclaimed miss greene. “i am sure her appearance must have been a very convincing argument.” she gave her opponent another searching glance. mrs. overman hodge-lathrop was having difficulty in getting her breath.
“we have been having a taste of lobbying, miss greene,” she began, “and—”
“how unpleasant!” said she.
“you know, possibly,” said mrs. overman hodge-lathrop, regaining something of her position.
“indeed i do,” miss greene assented sweetly, “but where it is in the line of one’s profession, duty obscures the unpleasantness. one can not, you know, always choose one’s occupation. good morning!”
and catching her skirts, with a smile and a bow she left.
the successful lobbyists stood in silence a moment, looked one to another with wide and staring eyes. then at last mrs. overman hodge-lathrop spoke.
“morley,” she said, “i do wish you could learn to discriminate in your introductions.”
