The Mystery of the Sycamore

“In a general way, I want your help. Wheeler’s wife and daughter are attractive, and you might manage to interest them and maybe sway their sympathies toward Sam – ”

“But they’ll stand by Mr. Wheeler?”

“Probably – yes. However, use your head, and do all you can with it.”

“And where do I come in?” asked Genevieve, who had been an interested listener.

“You don’t come in at all, Miss. You mostly stay out. You’re to keep in the background. I have to take you, for we’re only staying one night at Sycamore Ridge, and then going on to Boston, and I’ll need you there.”

“Yes, sir,” and the blue eyes turned from him and looked absorbedly into a tiny mirror, as Genevieve contemplated her pleasant pink-and-whiteness.

Her vanity and its accompanying box were matters of indifference to Mr. Appleby and to Keefe, for the girl’s efficiency and skill outweighed them and her diligence and loyalty scored one hundred per cent.

Appleby’s fetish was efficiency. He had found it and recognized it in his secretary and stenographer and he was willing to recompense it duly, even generously. Wherefore the law business of Samuel Appleby, though carried on for the benefit of a small number of clients, was of vast importance and productive of lucrative returns.

At present, the importance was overshadowed by the immediate interest of a campaign, which, if successful would land the second Appleby in the gubernatorial chair. This plan, as yet not a boom, was taking shape with the neatness and dispatch that characterized the Appleby work.

Young Sam was content to have the matter principally in his father’s hands, and things had reached a pitch where, to the senior mind, the coöperation of Daniel Wheeler was imperatively necessary.

And, therefore, to Wheeler’s house they must betake themselves.

“What do you know about the Wheeler business, kid?” Keefe inquired, after Mr. Appleby had left them.

Genevieve leaned back in her chair, her dimpled chin moving up and down with a pretty rhythm as she enjoyed her chewing-gum, and gazed at the ceiling beams.

Appleby’s offices were in his own house, and the one given over to these two was an attractive room, fine with mahogany and plate glass, but also provided with all the paraphernalia of the most up-to-date of office furniture. There were good pictures and draperies, and a wood fire added to the cheer and mitigated the chill of the early fall weather.

Sidling from her seat, Miss Lane moved over to a chair near the fire.

“I’ll take those letters when you’re ready,” she said. “Why, I don’t know a single thing about any Wheeler. Do you?”

“Not definitely. He’s a man who had an awful fight with Mr. Appleby, long ago. I’ve heard allusions to him now and then, but I know no details.”

“I, either. But, it seems we’re to go there. Only for a night, and then, on to Boston! Won’t I be glad to go!”

“We’ll only be there a few days. I’m more interested in this Wheeler performance. I don’t understand it. Who’s Wheeler, anyhow?”

“Dunno. If Sammy turns up this morning, he may enlighten us.”

Sammy did turn up, and not long after the conversation young Appleby strolled into the office.

Though still looked upon as a boy by his father, the man was of huge proportions and of an important, slightly overbearing attitude.

Somewhat like his parent in appearance, young Sam, as he was always called, had more grace and ease, if less effect of power. He smiled genially and impartially; he seemed cordial and friendly to all the world, and he was a general favorite. Yet so far he had achieved no great thing, had no claim to any especial record in public or private life.

At forty, unmarried and unattached, his was a case of an able mentality and a firm, reliable character, with no opportunity offered to prove its worth. A little more initiative and he would have made opportunities for himself; but a nature that took the line of least resistance, a philosophy that believed in a calm acceptance of things as they came, left Samuel Appleby, junior, pretty much where he was when he began. If no man could say aught against him, equally surely no man could say anything very definite for him. Yet many agreed that he was a man whose powers would develop with acquired responsibilities, and already he had a following.

“Hello, little one,” he greeted Genevieve, carelessly, as he sat down near Keefe. “I say, old chap, you’re going down to the Wheelers’ to-day, I hear.”

“Yes; this afternoon,” and the secretary looked up inquiringly.

“Well, I’ll tell you what. You know the governor’s going there to get Wheeler’s aid in my election boom, and I can tell you a way to help things along, if you agree. See?”

“Not yet, but go ahead.”

“Well, it’s this way. Dan Wheeler’s daughter is devoted to her father. Not only filial respect and all that, but she just fairly idolizes the old man. Now, he recips, of course, and what she says goes. So – I’m asking you squarely – won’t you put in a good word to Maida, that’s the girl – and if you do it with your inimitable dexterity and grace, she’ll fall for it.”

“You mean for me to praise you up to Miss Wheeler and ask her father to give you the benefit of his influence?”

“How clearly you do put things! That’s exactly what I mean. It’s no harm, you know – merely the most innocent sort of electioneering – ”

“Rather!” laughed Keefe. “If all electioneering were as innocent as that, the word would carry no unpleasant meaning.”

“Then you’ll do it?”

“Of course I will – if I get opportunity.”

“Oh, you’ll have that. It’s a big, rambling country house – a delightful one, too – and there’s tea in the hall, and tennis on the lawn, and moonlight on the verandas – ”

“Hold up, Sam,” Keefe warned him, “is the girl pretty?”

“Haven’t seen her for years, but probably, yes. But that’s nothing to you. You’re working for me, you see.” Appleby’s glance was direct, and Keefe understood.

“Of course; I was only joking. I’ll carry out your commission, if, as I said, I get the chance. Tell me something of Mr. Wheeler.”

“Oh, he’s a good old chap. Pathetic, rather. You see, he bumped up against dad once, and got the worst of it.”

“How?”

Sam Appleby hesitated a moment and then said: “I see you don’t know the story. But it’s no secret, and you may as well be told. You listen, too, Miss Lane, but there’s no call to tattle.”

“I’ll go home if you say so,” Genevieve piped up, a little crisply.

“No, sit still. Why, it was while dad was governor – about fifteen years ago, I suppose. And Daniel Wheeler forged a paper – that is, he said he didn’t, but twelve other good and true peers of his said he did. Anyway, he was convicted and sentenced, but father was a good friend of his, and being governor, he pardoned Wheeler. But the pardon was on condition – oh, I say – hasn’t dad ever told you, Keefe?”

“Never.”

“Then, maybe I’d better leave it for him to tell. If he wants you to know he’ll tell you, and if not, I mustn’t.”

“Oh, goodness!” cried Genevieve. “What a way to do! Get us all excited over a thrilling tale, and then chop it off short!”

“Go on with it,” said Keefe; but Appleby said, “No; I won’t tell you the condition of the pardon. But the two men haven’t been friends since, and won’t be, unless the condition is removed. Of course, dad can’t do it, but the present governor can make the pardon complete, and would do so in a minute, if dad asked him to. So, though he hasn’t said so, the assumption is, that father expects to trade a full pardon of Friend Wheeler for his help in my campaign.”

“And a good plan,” Keefe nodded his satisfaction.

“But,” Sam went on, “the trouble is that the very same points and principles that made Wheeler oppose my father’s election will make him oppose mine. The party is the same, the platform is the same, and I can’t hope that the man Wheeler is not the same stubborn, adamant, unbreakable old hickory knot he was the other time.”

“And so, you want me to soften him by persuading his daughter to line up on our side?”