The Seven Dead Men

HE Seven Dead Men, in the late evening, well toward midnight, was coming down a by-street in Chibosh so retired and inconsequential and obscure that it still had brick sidewalks. His actual name, before he was so wanted for the great graft investigation, was John Gallagher.

In the dim gaslight upon the uncertain pavement, he was advancing in a manner peculiar to himself at this time of night. Coming to a full stop upon the walk, he slowly and laboriously wound himself up with his right hand, making a noise in imitation of the winding of an old-fashioned clock. This act completed, he went forward three full steps, backward two, and then stopped again to wind up once more. His face was very serious, but his heart was well satisfied. The evening was the only time when he could venture forth from his hiding place, even in the remote and retired section of the city in which he had been forced, following the great graft investigation, to locate.

Advancing in this fitful manner, his progress, though agreeable and even humorous to himself, was necessarily slow. it was some time before he had passed from the comfortable speak-easy in the undistinguished basement which he had left, to the corner of the street on his journey home. The old street, of small old brick city houses, painted abnormally red, was entirely empty; the houses practically lightless.

The only figure underneath its flickering gaslights was the Seven Dead Men; the only sound, the intermittent progress of his footsteps, varied by the regular and excellent imitation of the winding of a clock,

It was a windy night. The gusts darkened intermittently the gas jets, set the Italian ice man's sign to squeaking and ruffled the ragged blinds upon the fronts of the little old-time red-painted brick houses, The Seven Dead Men, turning the corner into the next street, though not changing at all his method of progress, was forced to lower his head. The wild wind, growing wilder, took away his easily taken breath and brought the tears into his easily watering blue eyes.

He was making his regular advance with lowered head as he turned the corner, when he hit something firm and hard, and sat suddenly on the pavement. Looking up, he saw a large, fine, heavy figure of a woman, slightly younger than himself, leaning over him.

“You poor man,” she said, looking down at him. “I knocked you down, quite.”

Looking up, Mr. Gallagher—the Seven Dead Men of the great graft investigation of Chibosh—did not yet answer her.

She was evidently a kind-hearted and impulsive woman, as well as a fine, strong, healthy one, of a figure such as was preferred to the more spindling in the days when Mr. Gallagher was younger.

“The poor man,” she said, leaning over him. “He can't get up.”

That was the fact. He could not.

“Are you hurted, you poor man?” asked his assailant and benefactress, now bending over him and holding out a strong, capable hand—such as he used to see on the girls when he was a boy in the old Sixth Ward. “Can you stand?” she asked him now.

“I can some, maybe, ma'am,” said Mr. Gallagher, for being a strong, heavy, hearty figure of a woman, she had bumped the life most out of him.

She still supported him with her strong, capable hand.

“Come on,” she said now, “and show me where you live.”

“Right down there,” said Mr. Gallagher, pointing somewhat uncertainly.

“Come on then, I'll take you there,” she said, starting on with the action of a strong executive woman, such as his first wife had been.

Mr. Gallagher did not refuse, for the wind was still well out of him.

He also did not actually object, for he was a lonely man, long a widower, and she was a strong, capable, likable woman, who reminded him of his first wife; and her bonnet—one of the old small ones they used to wear—was just the kind he liked.

It seemed that she was rooming in the house just around the corner from his own rooming place—a widow woman, all alone in the world, having lost her last near relative during the war from the flu.

“'Tis terrible lonely,” she said, “ain't it?—to be all alone, just a roomer.”

“It is for a fact,” said Mr. Gallagher, and sighed. “With me especially.”

Standing holding to the low iron railing in front of the little bright-red-painted house where Mr. Gallagher spent all his days and the later nights in his strict seclusion, she talked very kindly to him before she left him.

“Look,” said Mr. Gallagher, when she said she must be going, “are you all alone there in your room by yourself, in daytimes?”

“I am,” she said.

“Then some day maybe I'll be coming in to see you,” said Mr. Gallagher.

“Be sure you do,” she said cordially.

And he watched her, looking so much like his first wife, go out of sight, before he turned and went up the few steps into the little brightly red brick house where he had to keep himself hidden daytimes.

From that time on the life of Mr. Gallagher, though no less rigidly secluded, was much less lonely than it had been before. By merely turning the corner he could have companionship which was always waiting. The lady who had run him down was always there in her room, located conveniently upon the front ground floor. Slipping in there unobserved, Mr. Gallagher could spend many hours pleasantly while she darned her stockings or mended her scanty wardrobe. She would often, also, sew buttons on for him, would always have a cup of tea upon a small alcohol lamp, and had no objection though she did not drink the stuff herself—to Mr. Gallagher's putting in a drop or two of rum, such as he felt that he needed in the later afternoon.

Under the influence of all this and of her being so much like his first wife, Mr. Gallagher in a comparatively few days mellowed to her and made her more and more a confidante, hinting from time to time at things that she should know—if he could only tell her.

It was on a dark and rainy spring day when, in fighting off the influence of the weather, he had five or six good drinks of rum in him, that he went on from that.

“You'd think maybe,” he said, “from how you see me now, that I was a poor man, without a cent, all ripe and ready for the poorhouse.”

“Oh, I wouldn't say that,” said his new-found friend, the Widow Henry, politely.

“Neither would you,” said Mr. Gallagher, “if you knew all.” And he looked around behind him.

“Is that the case?” asked the Widow Henry.

“It is,” said Mr. Gallagher; and, after steadying his voice, went on from there. “I was born a poor boy,” he said. “I told you that before. Down in the old Sixth Ward.”

“You did,” said the Widow Henry.

“The ward that Chinese Meeghan comes from,” said Mr. Gallagher, winking.

“Not the Meeghan—the one that runs the city underneath?” she asked him.

“The same. I went with him into politics when he got started.”

“You did not?” said the widow, looking up, surprised, from her darning.

“I did, then. And there's where I got my graft,” said Mr. Gallagher, “at last. The greatest graft,” he said, looking about the room and speaking now in a hoarse, thick, confidential whisper, “in all the city—from Meeghan!”

“How's that?” asked Mrs. Henry, speaking just a little faster. “For what did you get it?”

“For murder,” said Mr. Gallagher, hoarsely and thickly, with water in his eyes.

“For murder!” cried Mrs. Henry, starting back.

“Not so loud,” said Mr. Gallagher, looking around quickly, but not without a certain pride. “Murder, yes—or so they called it.”

“Murder!” said the widow once again.

“Yes,” he told her. “A shooting at the polls—for politics—that would no doubt have put me in the chair, and would still, today, only Meeghan stood between death and me, with his hand up, checking it.”

“Like a crossing cop,” said Mrs. Henry.

“Exactly the same,” said Mr. Gallagher. “And so, as I was telling you, when the real rich graft came I got in right.”

“How was that?” his companion asked him, puzzled as women often are by politics.

“Because, having death hanging over me, all times, for murder, he could trust me always, with everything.”

“I see it now,” said the Widow Henry.

“'Tis so always with Meeghan,” said Mr. Gallagher, “and those who serve him. And so, as I said, I got in right at last in the big  graft on the contract for the bridge the big Central Bridge.”

“Not that big one that fell down and killed all those people?” asked the Widow Henry.

“The same. The one that Chinese Meeghan had the contracts for—only he didn't have them in his own name, naturally.”

“Not in his own name?”

“No,” said Mr. Gallagher, explaining it to her as one does to a woman, “he being head of the party. So then it was fixed up in the deal into the hands of different subcontractors.”

“Yes?”

“Under a big company, of which Meeghan held the stock in secret; but having all phony subcontractors to dodge trouble and double-crossing and fighting at the law. For he done there like they all do so generally in politics and political deals; he rang in names that were no names of real living men. He used the names of dead men—as they all do, now and again, in politics.”

“I can see that, too,” said the Widow Henry, deeply impressed. “But go on now; tell it out.”

“So that they could not sue or fight back or make trouble for him,” he said, “doing so. And so there's where I came into the real big graft.”

“Yes?”

“Yes; for being a contractor myself in the old days, I was made his manager. I represented all the dead men—the seven dead contractors—and kept the accounts all straight for the city, like they had to be.”

“Then—then,” said the Widow Henry, looking up at him with both interest and awe, “you must be that Seven Dead Men that all the papers wrote and joked about in that big graft investigation that was made against that Chinese Meeghan!”

“I am,” said Mr. Gallagher. “That's why I'm here today. I am,” he said, with dignity in his voice but quick water in his eyes, “and that's what's worrying me all the time so, night and day.”

“What is?”

“Oh, gobs and slathers of things,” said Mr. Gallagher, the so-called Seven Dead Men. “It's shot me all to pieces. Look how my hand shakes on me this minute,” he said, and helped himself to another little snifter of rum. “For fear they'll find me, for one thing—them investigators,” he went on.

“Is that all?” asked the Widow Henry.

“It is not,” he said to her. “Nor the worst!” And he looked around him.

“What is then?” she asked, with a real sympathy in her voice.

“It's the key!” he whispered loudly.

“The what?”

“The key to that safe-deposit vault.”

“What's that?”

“The bank box where I have the records they was all after in that big graft investigation—to show up Meeghan being himself the Seven Dead Men, the contractors of that bridge that went down for want of proper building; the papers that they wanted when they were trying to get back through me to Meeghan; and me shutting my mouth till him and his lawyers worked me out, and I came down here to hide.”

“And would he let you have the key then—Meeghan?” the Widow Henry asked him.

“That's it; that's what's terrifying me so bad today,” said Mr. Gallagher.

“What is?”

“He's bound to have it off me now—the key—to destroy the papers.”

“Why don't you let him have it then?”

“How could I?”

“Why couldn't you?”

“Don't you see then how that would leave me,” he asked her, “if he had the key and once burned the papers, and my only self-protection was all gone? Don't you see,” asked Mr. Gallagher, “what would happen to me then—the first minute he was hard pressed?”

“I do not,” the Widow Henry told him.

“The next thing for me would be the prison, and no doubt the electric chair,” he said to her. “For then I would be all—100 per cent safe for Meeghan.”

“How so?” she asked him anxiously.

“Dead men tell no tales,” said Mr, Gallagher. “Nor convicts, neither, in a court of law. For the evidence of the convict, as you know, is as good as a poor ghost's there—and no better.”

“I see,” said Mrs, Henry now.

“But that's not all, neither,” said the so-called Seven Dead Men; “nor what's worrying me most now.”

“What is, you poor man?” she asked him.

“Death and murder for myself!”

“You're wrong!” said the Widow Henry nervously. “You must be!”

“Death and murder—for that key!” persisted Mr. Gallagher. “For now Meeghan sends down his threats to me; it will mean my life if I do not hand it over.”

“And yet you cannot do it?” said his companion.

“No,” said Mr. Gallagher. “And now he's starting after me with those men—those murderers!”

“Those what?” asked the Widow Henry in alarm, and waited. For her informant, the so-called Seven Dead Men, was taking in another little tod of rum,

“Those murderers he has,” he repeated, now wiping off his mouth with his hand. “The ones like me that he has stolen out one way or another from the sentence of death, and can send back again to it any time if they will not obey him. The ones he uses for such purposes like mine now,” said Mr. Gallagher, drawing his hand with a short but impressive gesture across his throat.

“For what?” the widow asked in horror.

“To bump them off.”

“You poor man!” said the Widow Henry instinctively.

“Yes,” he said, and bowed his head, his weak eyes suddenly watering again.

“And will you keep it then always—the key?” she asked him, once more breaking in upon his silence.

“Ah, that's it again,” said Mr. Gallagher, speaking rapidly and thickly once more. “That's what I fear with him—with Meeghan always after me, bound that he will have the key. Suppose then his murderers caught me out some night and banged me in the head and took it off me, when I carried it! What would happen to me then?” he asked her more and more hoarsely.

“What would?”

“I dunno,” he said darkly. “One of two things without doubt. He might give me up to the law and send me to the electric chair. Or he'd have his men there bump me off, maybe, as being the easiest and safest way of getting rid of me and what I know.”

“He would not!” exclaimed Mrs. Henry.

“He would that! You don't know him, or them under him that have to please him,” said the Seven Dead Men. “And then, on the other hand, suppose I left it hidden in my room, and these men got in and found it there—these men of his I see after me day by day,” he said hoarsely. “What then?”

“You poor man!” said Mrs. Henry with deep sympathy.

“You'd say so if you was in my boots,” said Mr Gallagher. “Ain't it the deep heart of hell? I drink because I'm grown so timid that I'll lose the key to all them records—them things that mean my life to me; and the more I drink to be easy and to forget, the more liable at any time I am to be losing it, and no doubt my life with it. See how my hand shakes right now—to think if anybody got it off of me!”

“You poor man!” said the Widow Henry, now laying down her darning on the little table beside her.

“I'm fair crazy,” said Mr. Gallagher.

“You poor man!” she said once more, watching him with friendly, pitying eyes. “You poor man, why must you worry yourself so over such a small thing as merely a key?”

“How could I help it, when I think what might come on me if I lost it?”

“You poor man!” said Mrs. Henry still again. “Why should you worry so? Why don't you just give the key to me?”

“Would you take it?” the Seven Dead Men asked her. “Now? Knowing all the dangers?”

“I would—for you!” said the Widow Henry warmly. “And I'll keep it for you too. Here, right underneath me heel in me own stocking. And good would be the man or saint or devil that would force or wheedle it out from there.”

“It would be safer there,” said Mr. Gallagher.

“It would,” said Mrs. Henry.

HE amateur investigator came into the modest rooms of the two women friends of hers, for whom she had been working. She was a strong, fine, comely woman of Irish ancestors, about fifty years of age. Sitting down, with no words, she unlaced and took off her right shoe and then her stocking, while the two women watched her.

Taking a small object from her stocking heel she held it toward them somewhat dramatically.

“I got it for ye,” she said briefly. “Like I said I would.”

“The key!” exclaimed the younger woman, with the close-cut curly hair, grasping it.

“Of the Seven Dead Men!” said the older, squarer-spoken woman with the carefully indifferent manner.

“Where all them records are,” said the investigator.

“That we're going to send that Meeghan to state's prison with,” added the younger and brighter-eyed one, and suddenly turned from harder to softer emotions. “Bridie, you're a duck!” she exclaimed, and warmly infolded the amateur investigator in her arms.

“Go on with you now!” said the one designated by that not inappropriate name, finally, though not seriously displeased, escaping from her embrace.

“Weren't you afraid?” her young questioner asked her.

“Of that murderer?” the older woman queried.

“What? Me?” exclaimed the substantial-framed amateur investigator warmly. “Afraid of that poor drunken shrimp? If he ever got funny with me I'd pinch him out between my finger and my thumb like a candle.”

“Is he there—at his house now?” they asked her.

“Sure then, where else would he be?” asked their agent. “There, drunk and fast asleep! And what'll you do with him now?” she asked them in her turn.

“We shall have him arrested—this morning,” said the older, “now we have obtained the key.”

“And then, Bridie,” said the younger, smiling pleasantly but bafflingly, “we're going to turn him loose.”

“You'll arrest him and then you'll turn him loose!” repeated their hearer, gazing from one to the other.

“Yes, Bridie,” said the younger, with her puzzling smile. “That is our purpose. We are about to turn the Seven Dead Men loose upon Chibosh.”

“Go on with you!” said Bridget Henry, identifying again that same dancing devil in her eyes she always had on her when she was a kid.

It was still there when, the visitor having gone, she called up on the telephone the special Federal district attorney, Mr. John Henry Peters, who had charge of the great Central Bridge horror investigation, reaching him at his home.

“We've got it for you, and we've located him,” she told him, and gave her details.

“Hurrah for you—and votes for women!” he replied. “We'll have him locked up safely in half an hour.”

It was just about that time afterward, when, hearing that this had been accomplished, they called up that Melody, that criminal faker who had been the administration's political press agent. Naturally he was much excited.

“Meeghan will call you up, we think,” Miss Dorothy Jones, the younger one, informed him.

“And then, after he has done so, you will come over here and consult with us,” the older, Miss Winthrop, directed.

He came, of course, right over, after Chinese Meeghan, that political boss of Chibosh they were after, had called him up and tried him out. He was all in pieces by this time, wondering what had happened.

“Where did you get it? How could you?” he asked, when they told him about the key and the evidence in the safe-deposit vault and the practical confession of the Seven Dead Men.

“Oh, that is very simple,” replied the younger one with that bright, polite smile that she had.

“When you know more of the activities and resources of the women,” said the older.

“There are thousands of women, of course, in a big city like this,” said the younger and more conciliatory, explaining, “who are ready to do anything for the women's cause.”

“The best women in the community,” added the older and more direct. “Quite contrary to the situation with the men in politics.”

“Who are willing to do anything, go to the front, anywhere,” continued the younger. “Join Mayor True's fake campaign organization; get testimony on Meeghan; find the Seven Dead Men!”

“Who was it that did that last job?” asked Mr. Melody, thinking of all the men who had failed on it. “If you don't mind telling me.”

“Oh, certainly not,” said the polite one. “It was a friend—an old nurse of mine—that caught him finally.”

“But working under us,” said the other—“our instructions, you understand. For the whole campaign against you and your Mayor True and your Chinese Meeghan began right here—in this room.”

“But what'll I do,” asked Mr. Melody, interrupting, thinking always of his own position, “now Chinese Meeghan knows that I have double-crossed him and will be getting after me?”

“He won't go after you,” said the older woman politician quite positively. “Not yet a while.”

“Not while he thinks he might trade with you—to save himself—will he?” asked the younger, softer-talking one.

“To extricate himself from the situation he now finds himself in,” explained the older.

“But—but,” stammered Mr. Melody, “that might be all right for now. But what can you do for me when Meeghan finally finds out that I have double-crossed him? How can you keep him from sending me back to prison then?”

“We will not disregard your interests when that time comes,” said the older. “You may be sure of that.”

“We'll get you off with the least possible punishment—if you can help us throughout, while we put Mr. Meeghan into prison for his responsibility for this Central Bridge matter,” said the other, continuing this cold comfort.

“If you are entirely faithful to us,” said the older one.

“I'll be faithful! I'll be faithful! You can count on that!” said Mr. Melody with forced enthusiasm.

“That's fine,” said the older.

“That's perfectly lovely,” said the younger one, “for we shall want now to keep you busy—to start you right away on your new work—for the press.”

“My new work!” repeated Mr. Melody, and paused, considering deeply, while she gave her answer.

“Yes,” she said. “While we turn loose the Seven Dead Men on Chibosh through the channels of the press.”

“Sure,” said Mr. Melody with a quick and intelligent alacrity. For he saw, of course, just what they were after. “We'll turn him loose and wild!”

T WAS on Monday morning, in the press of Chibosh, that there came the account of the capture of the Seven Dead Men by a mysterious woman, a sensation overshadowing and burying under a smaller headline even the tremendous crisis in international ward politics caused by the combination of the world-wide anarchist plot in the greeting of Mayor True to General Gonfardino, which had been spread over every front page on the morning previous.

The Peoples Pictures displayed as its opening two large portraits, side by side, of a man past middle age, with a small, round, close-haired head and rather watery-looking eyes; and a large, substantial, round-faced woman in a small hat—the whole ornamented at the four corners with cupids, tied with ribbons and connected with a chain of keys to form a border. Over this, it asked in bold black type:

On an inside page, continuing this thought, it said:

In opening, it raised the question:

The Morning Truth, upon its front page, further developed and illustrated the last thought of this paragraph. It said in its opening first-page headline:

Following this, it said more fully in its text:

It was with intense surprise that, following this, the citizens of Chibosh received in the later edition of Peoples Pictures, that very day, the first news, or even intimation, of the unanticipated collapse of its chief executive. In busy offices, in restless streets, in both humble and palatial homes, they read with a distinct sense of shock the unexpected headline:

Beneath, in the center of the page, on a photograph of the great transatlantic steamship Imperatrix was indicated the bed about which the mayor's family and physician, Dr. George Barclay Beagle, had gathered before his sailing. Beneath this were disposed the various popular portraits of the active mayor—while speaking in defense of the American flag, while addressing the Schützenbund on Justice for Germany, while pushing the baby carriage of a constituent, and while patting the last fire-department horse on the nose.

On its inside pages, elaborating the breath-taking news more fully, it said:

In the opening of the explanatory text it said:

Supplementing this, the headlines and text of the Evening Truth said:

PON Tuesday morning—so fast were events moving in Chibosh—the sudden going of Mayor True, though still vivid in all minds, was displaced upon the front page of the Morning Truth for its leading headline by the question:

Elaborating this, it gave an interview with the attorneys of the arrested man, Goldfish & Goldfish, who spoke with indignation upon the legal outrage which was being perpetrated under the eyes of all the citizens of Chibosh upon not only their client but the American people:

Nevertheless, later on in the morning, the right of habeas corpus was in fact denied to their client, Mr. Gallagher. This development, though given first place in the Evening Truth, was awarded second consideration in Peoples Pictures. In a later edition of this the leading headline said:

Below this it gave the pictured record of an interesting story its photographic staff had secured on the water front, showing the taking away from the city for treatment of the brother, it was alleged, and business partner of Chinese Meeghan. Different snapshots showed the ambulance and the attendants, and the stretcher on which the patient was taken aboard the steamer. The face of the sick man was not shown, but other portraits given showed the great personal resemblance between the stricken man, who it was said was on his way to Europe for treatment, and his more celebrated brother and partner, Chinese Meeghan, the silent master politician of Chibosh.

The text published with these pictures was more than usually scant. Neither the ambulance attendants nor the house of the sick man desired to give details beyond the fact that it was he who had gone. And Chinese Meeghan himself could not be found.

It was upon Wednesday morning that the error in this account was corrected and the full facts revealed by the headlines and text of the rival popular publication, the Morning Truth, when it said:

In explanation it said:

It was on this same afternoon, of the day following the news of the refusal of the issue of habeas corpus to John Gallagher, the Seven Dead Men, that his attorneys, Goldfish & Goldfish, sat in deep conversation with Mr. Michael F. Melody, manager of the Phantom Factory of Mayor True.

Entirely unexpectedly to himself, by the sudden and unnatural movements of his principals during the past few days, this official still sat in the offices which he had so long directed, holding them very calmly by default. His calm, still face still looked blandly across his desk at Messrs. Goldfish and Goldfish as they addressed him from under the great identical portraits of Mayor Herman J. True, until recently the mayor of Chibosh, speaking warningly, as they repeated their offer.

“Take it or leave it! It's our last offer!” said Mr. I. Goldfish.

“One hundred thousand dollars!” said Mr. A. Goldfish, smiling damply.

“If you don't take it you're lost!” said the younger attorney in a hard voice.

“One hundred thousand!” repeated the older alluringly.

“You know what Meeghan will do to you,” stated the younger, “if you don't come through! How long you'll be out of jail when he knows you've done him finally!'

“The same as with Gallagher,” said the older Goldfish. “Meeghan speaks the word—bing! Gallagher goes to the chair! He sends a wireless—bing! You go back to Federal prison!”

“Will it do you any good—all this?” asked Mr. Melody, speaking, but merely to gain time.

“That's our business,” said I. Goldfish coldly.

“Sure it will do good,” said his more amiable father. “Ain't we got Gallagher where we want him—sewed up? And can't we sew up that safe-deposit business for months and months with the legal acts we know? Ain't the woman and you all there is left?”

“Yes; and when I come through for you, what about me?” asked Mr. Melody. “How'll I know I'll be protected?”

“We'll fix that up,” said I. Goldfish.

“Easy! Easy!” said his friendly father.

“And what can these women do for you,” asked I. Goldfish, “when Meeghan once gets after you?”

“Nothing,” his father answered for Mr. Melody. “Nothing, nothing! Not even keep him out of jail!”

“Well, what do you say?” demanded the younger, gruffer Goldfish. “Make it snappy!”

“One hundred thousand!” said the alluring older Goldfish once again, smiling still more poignantly. .

“Two hundred thousand and I'll do it!” said Mr. Melody.

“Two hundred thousand—for just one little wedding!” said the older, more emotional Goldfish, shaking a sad head. “Crazy! Crazy! All gone!”

“Will you start right after her tonight?” his more abrupt son asked Mr. Melody, interrupting with a gesture.

“In thirty seconds,” said Mr. Melody.

“You're on!” said I. Goldfish.

T WAS Friday, the second morning from this, giving Mr. Melody but one day of work on his new enterprise, that Peoples Pictures once more startled the reading population of Chibosh with its opening statement indicating more news in this remarkable case:

Below this were pictures of Mr. Gallagher, the so-called Seven Dead Men, of Mrs. Bridget Henry, his captor, who alleged she had been offered a huge bribe to wed the former, of the widow's sitting room, in which this was said to have taken place; and still another, purporting to be—but not really being—a likeness of Mr. Michael F. Melody, the most carefully unknown man in Chibosh. In the story on its inner page it said:

The Truth, in its evening edition, following a story similar to this in the morning, gave the following news its leading headlines:

It was on Saturday that further light was thrown upon the baffling matter of greatest sentimental and sensational interest in Chibosh, the wedding conspiracy of the Seven Dead Men, by the Morning Truth's leading headline:

In opening its story it stated:

Left suspended in the air by this new mystery in the mysterious wedding bribery case in the career of the mysterious Mr. Gallagher, the citizens of Chibosh were not advanced to a further understanding until the following morning, when the enterprise of the Morning Truth led them further, through the following headlines and text:

T WAS on Sunday, the morning following this interview, that Miss Dorothy Jones, the new president of the Chibosh Women Voters' Association—recently the True Women Home Defenders—and Miss Adelaide Winthrop, its secretary, were in their modest rooms in the older residence section of the city, according another interview to the newspaper representatives of the metropolis on the women's political movement of today, and an estimate of its membership.

“Tell us, won't you, Miss Winthrop,” asked the blond lady reporter, speaking for the three male reporters with her, in the easy but deferential way she had, “all about the women in politics—just where they have arrived today. How they compare with the men in politics.”

The three men reporters gazed with her at the severe but sophisticated figure before them.

“They compare very well, in my opinion,” she now asserted, “in spite of many common misconceptions. For instance,” she stated, going on, “the women are the really organized sex in this country. I suppose you know that.”

The three male reporters back a little dimly. But the blond lady reporter again spoke for them.

“You must tell them, Miss Winthrop,” she said. “Men don't understand.”

“Any man must know,” the latter said, scrutinizing the male reporters, “that his own women now belong to more societies than he does himself—and more important ones. That is, among the better-class women, the really American women, especially in the past ten years.

“There are six million members of women's organizations in this country today,” she asserted—“all organizations of the better class, who constitute the new element in American politics, under active women leaders.”

“Political organizations?” hazarded the young male reporter.

“No and yes,” replied his instructress. “They were not organized primarily for politics. They were organized often along other lines—literary, social, religious, temperance—along higher lines of principle. But gradually their principles took them into politics.

“You may object,” said the speaker, gazing at them, as one practical person to another, “that all this organization of women is academic, utopian, impractical, entirely different from the so-called practical politics of men. And in that, I am glad to say, I agree with you.

“What,” she asked now logically and severely, “is the great outstanding feature of the so-called practical politics in America today as it has been conducted by the men?”

The male reporters indicated by shaking their heads that they did not know.

“That it is founded upon a system of discards,” she asserted. “Is it not?”

“A system of discards?” repeated the oldest male reporter, quite clearly puzzled by the expression.

“Certainly,” said the speaker. “You must know that. It is written all over the American history of the past fifty years. The more prosperous and busier and more successful men do not take time to perform their political duties—you know that. They discard the whole matter of politics, and it falls necessarily, by default, into the hands of the less successful and less intelligent, who find it worth their while to take it up. So not only the voting but the conduct of politics, discarded, falls into the hands of social and economic discards.”

“You mean?” asked the lady reporter politely.

“I mean,” returned their teacher, “what you all know, that men in political life—pubic men, officials, and especially political managers—are largely the discards of the more attractive and lucrative professions; men who have not fitted in, usually have not ability to fit in elsewhere. They are discards. And when it comes to great cities the discard is pretty deep. For the type of men in practical politics there—rising largely from the slums—are the discards not only of the city but of their own section; men who have failed as a class to measure up to the better jobs provided even by the poorest section. How could it be otherwise, with the present attitude of men toward politics? But I need not tell you this,” she said, appealing to her listeners. “You know that from meeting politicians in your profession.”

Three of the four reporters seemed to nod assent to this statement, though somewhat slowly and thoughtfully.

“So when they speak of corruption as the main fault in our political system as it has been conducted by men,” continued their instructress, “I am inclined very much to dispute the statement. It is not honesty that we so much lack—bad as that lack is—but intelligence; a lack brought about by the process of discards which I have just outlined to you—the American man's system of government by discards the so-called practical politics of the men of this country. They have succeeded the men—in organizing politics of this country from the bottom up. That is the net result of their boasted practical politics. On the whole, I prefer, if necessary, the more impractical form of politics—if it is impractical—as organized by the women.”

“Just what is that,” inquired the blond lady reporter, “if we may ask?”

“Women organize—or have so far—from the top down; and I for one prefer this type of organization—from the women's clubs and the church societies and the temperance organizations down—to the men's organization of their so-called practical politics from the bottom up—from the slums up, in other words. It furnishes rather more character, and certainly as much brains,” she said.

“If we do say so!” broke in the other and younger woman, the president of the new organization, who had been listening without speech, with merely an occasional bright, cordial but baffling smile.

“Why shouldn't we say so if it is true?” asked her companion with a rigid insistence. “Why shouldn't we say that woman's coming brings a new force into American politics, both morally and intellectually? That the church is founded on the work and loyalty of woman, that the temperance movement was hers, and most of the welfare work—that she today has more leisure, more interest to give to public affairs than man? And that she is rapidly transferring some of the zeal and devotion which went into her religion, especially in the comparative leisure of her later life, to public affairs?”

“Then you think,” asked the blond lady reporter, gazing a little quizzically at her male companions, “that on the whole the woman voter is apt to be a better citizen than the man?”

“Let the facts speak for themselves,” the one questioned replied. “In what parts of Chibosh is the largest percentage of registration and voting by the men? In the slums and the less prosperous and less educated sections, is it not?”

The male reporters nodding, admitted this.

“And what about the women?”

“It is just the other way around,” said the lady reporter triumphantly. “I looked it up. You'd be surprised. I was. They can't make the women register and vote in the poorer districts.”

“Exactly,” said the secretary of the Chibosh Women Voters' Association. “Women organize and function in politics from the top down—directly opposite from the men. And that is why we are going to elect John Henry Peters mayor this fall. Aren't we?” she said to the male reporters, now questioning in her turn.

“How can you help it,” replied one, “since his work on this bridge-graft investigation?”

“It will be unanimous, as far as I can see,” the second one confirmed him. “Who'll oppose him? The old gang has all skipped town.”

“Since you let loose the Seven Dead Men on them,” said the third, who, being Irish, had a ready sense of humor.

“Exactly,” said Miss Winthrop, and stopped, being interrupted. For her younger companion, the president of the new women's organization, was now speaking, after looking with the cordial but somewhat puzzling smile she had over toward the Irish reporter with the crooked, humorous grin.

“You have forgotten,” she said then to her associate, “to speak of organized women's greatest power in politics.” As she said this she placed her hand upon the high card-catalogue cabinet, about which they were all standing. “You have spoken of woman's organization in politics, of her better education, of her greater zeal, her moral force,” she continued; “but not a word of this!”

Saying this, and with a half-humorous look, she patted on the high cabinet as upon the shoulder of an old friend.

“What is that?” inquired the four representatives of the press.

“It is one little part of what the six million organized women of this country know today about the men politicians of the United States.”

“Tell us about that!” cried all four reporters eagerly.

And for the next two hours the two women did so.

T WAS at the expiration of this time—when the reporters had gone—that a discreet knock at the door indicated another visitor, and the younger of the two women politicians opened it and let him in.

“Mr. Melody!” she cried, stepping back in surprise.

“Yes,” he admitted.

“I thought you had gone abroad!”

“Having lost your memory,” said the older woman in a severe and caustic voice.

“Of all you promised us,” added the other one, in tones of continued accusation.

“I'll tell you the truth,” said Mr. Melody hurriedly. “I'll tell you the truth. I didn't go abroad because I couldn't. I've been chased so—you've given me so much publicity in this thing that I haven't been able to get home and get a clean collar, or dare to buy one!”

Looking at him, they saw he spoke the truth.

His calm immaculateness was all gone. His collar was not fresh nor his shirt. He was not well shaven. His light checked suit was that of a man who has slept, with poor accommodations, away from home. Only his diamond rings and his patent-leather shoes still shone, and the latter were slightly spotted with mud.

And now he was pleading with them—flushed, excited—to forgive his faults; making one final appeal to woman's mercy.

“I know. I know I did you dirt,” he said. “I know I double-crossed you.”

“Or tried to!” the younger one corrected him.

“Tried to is right,” asserted Mr. Melody with a bitter, rueful smile. “But now won't you do this? Won't you let me go abroad with the rest of them? What good will it do you to put me back in prison?”

The two women looked at each other, the more severe unmoved, the younger woman evidently more interested. “But what's keeping you?” the latter asked.

“Publicity!” cried Mr. Melody in a sharp voice. “This darned publicity about me in all the papers!”

“Well, what can we do?” asked the younger woman, with just a touch, Mr. Melody felt, of mockery in her smile. “Why do you come to us?”

“Of all persons!” said the other.

“Because I must,” said Mr. Melody poignantly.

“Why? How is that?” they asked him together.

“To ask you to let up—let up, for heaven's sake!” cried Mr. Melody harshly. “Stop feeding all this publicity about me to the newspapers. If you'll only let me drop off the front page I'll do the rest. I'll get abroad all right.”

“And what will you do if you get there?” inquired the younger woman after a slight pause.

“I'll be all right. I'll be all right,” said Mr. Melody eagerly. “I'm on the track of a job there—with big money—that I know I can land.”

“What's that?”

“I've got a chance to go right in on the European publicity stuff—you know. The propaganda work for that European bunch—in the United States.”

“To get us to deliver to them what is left! To enable them to foreclose on our shoes!” said the older in an unfriendly and even hostile voice.

But the other one was more responsive to his look of pleading.

“Why not let him go?” she asked with her polite smile. “After all, he couldn't send over anything worse than that stuff the international press agents are sending over here now.”

Eventually this counsel of mercy prevailed.

“We'll hold off on the publicity we give you,” promised the younger one. “We won't speak of you to the papers—till you get off!”

“Oh, thank you, thank you, ladies!” said Michael F. Melody, taking her hand with an almost moving-picture emotion.

“You are thoroughly welcome,” she answered him in that voice of extraordinarily cordial, almost cooing politeness she assumed at times, but soon withdrawing her hand from his.

Readjusting the lapels of his somewhat unpressed spring suit, with more self-confidence than before in the past forty-eight hours, the most carefully unknown man in Chibosh—once the manager of Mayor Herman J. True's Phantom Factory—left the room with the high card-catalogue cabinet, on his way to follow his former associates, now on the Continent of Europe.

The name of Michael F. Melody, after its one brief appearance, now dropped again from the press of Chibosh—its owner hoped, forever. But the Seven Dead Men, set loose by his captors, the two women politicians with the card catalogue, still dominated the front pages of the journals of that great city, and through them the great mass of the citizen voters; destined, as all in that marvelous metropolis now knew, to lead on the great current political revolution there to its end; to choose as mayor in the coming fall a youngish red-headed attorney, John Henry Peters—already hailed by all the press as the choice of all the people, following his remarkable success in the investigations which have led to the widely famous indictments in the case of the People of Chibosh versus John Gallagher, the so-called Seven Dead Men, and a large group of other defendants, now nearly all of parts unknown.