University of Virginia Library

51. CHAPTER LI.
JOSIE SETTLES WITH MR. JAKE PIKE.

It was battle season with Josie; the great
struggle with Hollowbread was followed by
other tremendous combats; it seemed as if
the winning of her claim were only the beginning
of wars and tumults.

Her next fight, after dislodging and driving
out poor Hollowbread, was with Mr. Jacob
Pike. Josie did not at all want to have
a disagreement with him, and she contrived
to evade him for a while by messages that
she was not at home, that she was out of
town, and so on.

But at last, by dint of bribing a servant-maid,
he obtained unheralded admission to
our heroine's private parlor.

It was curious, by-the-way, to note what
a change appeared in his expression when
he came face to face with her. Believing
that she had been trying to dodge him, and
fearing lest she did not mean to pay him, he
had ascended the stairs on menacing tiptoes
and with a very glum countenance. Yet the
moment he laid eyes on her, and heard her
gracious salutation, he was re-assured and
mollified. Josie, though both surprised and
displeased by his advent, rallied her self-possession
in an instant, and received him with

a show of cordiality which amounted to rejoicing.

Mr. Pike, on his part, was honestly glad;
he was even much more glad than she could
look. He marched into the parlor with the
cheerful smile of a good man who has done a
worthy action, and of course expects friendly
greetings and a fitting reward.

“Well, Mr. Pike, what is the news?” asked
Josie, glancing with some secret timidity
at his pugnaciously broad cheek-bones and
solid jaws, and pondering the while how she
could induce him to leave with the understanding
of calling again.

“Well, ma'am, the news is, ninety thousand
dollars to you and ten thousand to
me,” responded Mr. Pike, with genial humor.
“Of course you know it, and I don't want to
waste your valuable time in bragging of it.
I will simply say, shortly and sweetly, that
I've called to tuttle.”

“I don't quite comprehend you, Mr. Pike.
What do you mean?”

“Why, ma'am, it's an old story. Something
about a firm named Call & Tuttle.
Fellow steps in and says, `I've called to tuttle.'
What I mean is, that I've called to settle.”

“But, Mr. Pike, I don't want to tuttle,” observed
Josie, with a little laugh, partly of
embarrassment and partly meant to gain
time.

Mr. Pike laughed, too; it was very amusing,
of course; wasn't she jolly! He began
to think that he should learn to like her himself,
and feel willing to do jobs for her at half-price,
as he had done this one without feeling
willing.

“Certainly,” he guffawed. “There's nothing
meaner than tuttling. But such is business.
We order, and then we pay, and somebody
else pays us, and so it goes. You've
found it a pretty good working rule so far,
Mrs. Murray.”

Now, if Josie had but got one hundred and
ten thousand dollars, she would probably
have allowed him the odd ten thousand
without much delay, though not without regret.

But to dig into her round hundred thousand,
to make it uncomely and incomplete
and ragged, to haggle a corner out of it, was
really dreadful. Since the passing of her
claim she had set her mind on investing a
solid hundred thousand, and drawing the
full, undiminished, respectable, regal revenue
of it.

“I don't think I can pay you at present,”
she ventured to remark.

“Hey?” inquired the Congressional agent,
beginning to be anxious again.

“In fact, I don't think I can pay you at
all,” added Josie.

“Why, you've got the money, haven't
you?” he asked, sharply. “You've got it,
sure?”

“I mean that I don't owe you any thing,
Mr. Pike,” stammered our heroine, still a
good deal frightened at her own courage, if
one may so express it.

“Don't owe me any thing!” exclaimed the
horrified and disgusted Pike. “Why, I carried
your bill for you, didn't I?”

“Mr. Hollowbread worked for me,” said
Josie, not in the least ashamed of using that
abused man's name. “And so did Mr. Drummond,
and General Bangs, and Mr. Smyler,
and ever so many more. And they voted
for me, too. You have no vote, you know.”

“Mrs. Murray, this is the first time that
ever I heard any thing like this,” remonstrated
the ex-Congressman, with more regard
for effect than for truth; seeing that many
a time before had a wicked world sought to
swindle him. “I've been in the job line now
for four years, and I never was bilked yet,
nor nobody ever tried to bilk me.”

“I don't know what you mean by bilk.
If it means taking advantage of people, I
should like to know what you are doing.
Five thousand dollars is a great deal to ask
for a few minutes of walking about and
whispering.”

“Five thousand!” stared Mr. Pike. “It
was ten thousand.”

“I beg your pardon, Mr. Pike; it was five,”
asserted Josie, just as readily and positively
as if she were telling the truth.

“No, ma'am! Ten—I said ten!”

“Yes, I know you said ten thousand at
first; but afterward you said five thousand.
Oh, you said all sorts of things. You wanted
half, and then you wanted a third, and
then you wanted something else, and finally
you came down to five thousand. I don't
wonder that you don't remember exactly
what you did agree to. As for me, I couldn't
have forgotten, because this was my only affair
of the sort. It doesn't stand to reason,
Mr. Pike, that you should recollect one out
of your twenty or forty bargains better than
I can recollect my only one.”

“Gracious Jehu!” gnashed the lobbyist,
in despair over such an argument, which he
knew to be as utterly unfounded as it was
plausible. “Well, you did agree to five thousand,
then?” he added, adroitly.

“I said that you agreed to five thousand,”
our admirable heroine promptly returned.

Mr. Pike stared at her for several seconds,
with an expression curiously compounded
of anger, perplexity, greed, and desperation.
Then he re-opened his case, and pleaded it
over from the beginning, step by step, and
trick by trick, and roguery by roguery. He
told how he had implored one member; how
he had argued till he was hoarse with another;
how much per head he had promised
three or four leading “war-horses;” how
much he had advanced out of his own pocket
to certain “dead-beats.” He recited the
sums which were due to newspaper-men,

who, but for the same, would have “slaughtered
the section,” and to various brother
lobbyists whom he had been obliged to divide
with under fear of incurring their opposition.

This statement was so detailed and complete
that it undeniably sounded like an accurate
one, if we may not use the epithet
honest. In fine, he figured down his own
residuum of the commission to something
less than a poor couple of thousands.

“And I'll leave it to any honorable man if
that an't little enough for the job, and five
times too little;” he concluded, with the energy
of conscious integrity. “I'll leave it to
any white man, any square-minded man, that
you know. There an't any other agent in
Washington, nor nowhere else in all Christ's
kingdom, could have got it through for twice
the figger. You pay me ten thousand, and
then credit yourself with ten thousand saved,
and you'll just hit it, Mrs. Murray.”

“It does seem so high,” answered the unconvinced
Josie. “Ten thousand dollars is
a great deal of money, Mr. Pike.”

“On a cussory view, yes. But when you
come to look at it doggedly and seriatim, it
isn't so much. This is in greenbacks, you
know, and prices have risen since gold times,
and Congressmen have gone up worse than
any thing.”

“But what was the use of spending and
promising so recklessly?” recommenced our
indefatigable heroine, a perfect master of the
argument called repetition. “I was sure to
get my appropriation. What was I asking
for? Nothing but my own money. It was
a perfectly just case, and every body knew
it.”

“There wasn't any justice about it!” burst
out Jake Pike, losing his temper again.
“There wasn't a two-spot of justice in my
hand!”

That was the weakness of this otherwise
estimable lobbyist; he lost his temper as
often as ever an old lady lost her spectacles.

“And how do I know that all this money
will go as you say?” continued Mrs. Murray,
improving her advantage. “I am not acquainted
with you as a business man. Before
bringing in such a bill, you ought to
show me the vouchers.”

“Vouchers!” he laughed or gasped, for the
idea excited him to both contempt and impatience.
“Do you suppose members will
sign their names to papers owning that they
have took bribes? Come, now, that's pretty
hard on Congressmen, that is! That's
the same as saying you think they are born
fools! Of course they won't sign no such
papers. I'll tell you what I'll do,” he added,
thinking to frighten her; “I'll fetch the
gentlemen themselves!”

“I won't see them,” declared Josie, snappishly.

“I guess I'd better fetch them,” contin
ued Pike, believing that he had “got her,” as
he would have expressed it.

“If you do, I'll leave Washington; I'll
complain to the police. I am not obliged to
see all the low people whom you choose to
bring here, nor to see you either.”

There was no use in this threat, clearly;
and he turned once more to persuasion.

“You ought not to damage me, Mrs. Murray.
After all the good work I've done for
you, you ought not to give me a gird. And
you are damaging me bad. You are making
me forfeit my word and lose my character.
If these promises are dishonored, it will
cut into my business. How can you expect
members to stand by agents if they don't feel
certain agents will stand by them? There
an't a claimant in Washington, or out of it,
but what'll suffer more or less if this job of
yours an't settled for. You'll do a mischief
that'll last for years and years. I tell you,
Mrs. Murray, that I know all this, and I feel
it. If you don't pay these little bills, I shall
have to pay 'em myself.”

“I don't care whether you do or not,” responded
the pitiless Josie. “You have made
enough in other things to afford it. And as
for these Congressmen of yours, they are
low, mean, shabby creatures, and I don't care
if they never get a cent. It was mere justice,”
she insisted, once more. “I don't want
to pay for justice. Justice ought to be free.”

“But how about injustice?” demanded Mr.
Pike, thinking for the tenth time that he
had got her.

“There hasn't been any,” responded Josie,
with admirable readiness, directness, and
simplicity. He could make no progress;
the discussion kept swinging back to where
it started; the claim was just, and the money
was hers.

“Look here, Mrs. Murray!” he began again.
Supposing I was a lawyer, and had won a
great case for you—”

“But you are not a lawyer,” she interrupted,
with the readiness of a good logician.
“And that makes a great difference. If
yours was a regular profession and an honorable
one, I would consider your extraordinary
charges more patiently. But it is no
such thing; it is an underhanded, shameful
business; and I mean to give one lobbyist a
lesson.”

“By George, if you don't beat the deuce!”
returned Mr. Pike, glaring in utter amazement
at this impudence. “Look here, ma'am,
I tell you what!” he broke out, giving way
to his unhappy temper anew. “If you don't
pay that ten thousand right straight down,
every cent of it, I'll tell on you. I don't
care what becomes of the business, I'll tell
on you. I'll expose the whole history, the
whole illegality and perjury of your job, I
will, by thunder!”

“I don't care what you tell,” snapped Josie,
rather enlivened than daunted by these

threats. “You are a—nobody, and people
won't believe a word you say. Every body
knows what you are.”

“And every body knows what you are!”
retorted the ex-Congressman, meaning more
and worse than he could have proved.

“I am a lady,” said Josie, bridling and
flushing, though she did not comprehend the
broad bearing of his scoff. “I have simply
got my own money, and I don't mean to be
robbed of it. You have no right to say any
thing against me because of that. And I
don't believe you have a right to come here
at all and demand things of me in this violent
way. If I owe you any thing, you should
send your bill in writing, civilly, and not
plunge into my rooms in this fashion and insult
me.”

“Send a bill!” exclaimed poor Pike, who
was led on from surprise to surprise, and
whose reason began to reel under such a succession
of whimsies. “Nonsense and gammon!
People don't send bills for this sort
of service—not yit. I never heard of such
a thing. It's just perfect, unmitigated nonsense
and gammon.”

“It seems to me that you might be more
gracious in your language when I suggest an
idea to help you along,” replied Josie, with
distracting composure and urbanity.

Mr. Pike had read of people tearing their
hair, and had looked upon the alleged performance
as a sheer, silly invention, only to
be met with in illustrated weeklies. But
he felt now that it would be a great relief to
shove his hard hands into his brashy scalp
and tweak the very seams open. He sat silent
for a moment, staring at Josie in stolid
despair, and trying in vain to see through
his millstone in petticoats. She was the
most contrary creature, the most indefatigably
and unseizably contrary creature, that
he had ever met with. She would not do,
and could not be trapped into doing, any
thing that suited his purposes. When he
tried to argue, she snapped at him; and when
he bristled up for a fight, she was good-natured.
He was like a bandaged lubber in
blind-man's-buff, who bangs himself against
the furniture at every step, and never catches
any body. And she was like the greased pig
whom no grip can hold to, or like the famous
spry little pig who could not be counted.
He had run himself mentally out of breath
after her, and she was still as fresh and as
far beyond his reach as ever.

“If you came here simply to insult me,”
added Josie, by way of finishing her stunned
assailant, “I should say that you had accomplished
your object, and might feel free to
go.”

“Oh, come now, Mrs. M., don't let's quarrel
about this!” urged Pike, placatingly, for he
hated to leave without his pay. “If I've said
any thing hasty, I apologize. Perhaps we
could come to a little bit of a compromise
somehow. You asked me to put your claim
through, and I done it. Now, what would
you like to allow me for it? Just say your
say, and then I'll say my say.”

“I don't know but I would pay what you
say you have paid out for me,” returned Josie,
after some pondering. “That is four
hundred dollars, according to your account.
Then, I will give you one hundred dollars
for your trouble.”

If Jacob Pike's face had been a slice of
bacon toasting on a hot gridiron, it could not
have writhed and shriveled more than it did
under this offer.

“Why not put it the other way?” he
smirked, or tried to smirk. “I'd rather settle
honestly with my members than with
myself. Throw out the five hundred; I'll
get nothing and lose something; then you
pay the rest. Come now, Mrs. Murray, I'll
compromise on ninety-five hundred, and
that's cheap enough.”

“You might as well say ten thousand at
once,” was the intelligent response. “I
won't do it,” she added, with the noble tone
of one who resists an imposition.

Then Mr. Pike arose in his wrath and his
dignity, or, as he would have called it, his
“dig.” He had been an auctioneer not many
years previous, and he lifted up his right arm
as if it still wielded the fateful hammer.

“All or none!” he said, in an awful voice.
“I ask you once more, ma'am, will you pay
me that ten thousand? I ask you three
times. Will you do it? Once — twice—
thrice?”

Josie was a little startled by this ceremony,
but she bravely said “No” each time.

“Then I am done with you!” fairly shouted
Jacob, not knowing what to do but shout,
unless he should dash his brains out against
the wall.

“I am very glad to hear it,” said Josie,
with commendable spunk.

But although Mr. Pike stalked to the door
and opened it, he did not leave. He meditated
a moment, came back a step or two,
and stared at her perplexedly.

“I thought you were going, sir,” observed
Josie, rising to her feet, with a vague hope
that she could rustle and “shu” him out, as
if he were a hen.

“I want that check,” he sulked, quite
hoarse and pale. “I—want—that—check!”

“Will you leave the room, sir?” she demanded,
a good deal scared meanwhile, for
his expression was menacing.

“Not till I have that check first.”

“Then you may stay here,” replied Josie,
skipping deftly by him and out of the door.
“I will see the landlady, and tell her to
charge you the rent,” she added from the
hall. “And if there is any thing missing
from my property, I shall hold you responsible
to the police.”

“Bully for you!” Jacob furiously bawled

after her; but she had already vanished into
some room whither he did not feel free to
follow her: she had probably not even heard
his farewell explosion of rage.

Thus left to himself, he looked furiously
about him, clapped his hat upon his wooden
head, expectorated on the hired carpet, and,
in short, insulted the little apartment. But
presently he recollected how useless all this
was, and, with a rather sneaking demeanor,
quietly took his leave.

Meantime Josie, safely ensconced in the
landlady's private parlor, and prattling easily
of commonplace matters, waited to see
him depart. So intent was she upon this
event, that for some little time she did not
notice a gentleman on the other side of the
street, who had halted, and seemed to be wistfully
surveying her through the half-opened
window. He was a portly and rather elderly
person, slovenly in dress, ghastly in countenance,
and woe-begone in expression.

“I wonder who that gentleman is?” queried
the spectacled hostess. “He is there
every day—two or three times a day—walking
up and down, and staring at the house.”

The moment our heroine raised her eyes
toward the stranger he took off his hat with
an air of reverential respect, though also of
profound melancholy. Josie nodded, smiled
cordially, and called, in a sweet soprano:
“Howdedo-o?”

Then she shut the window, and her rejected
adorer passed sorrowfully onward,
tottering a little in his gait, as failing elderly
gentlemen are wont to do.

It was Mr. Hollowbread.