CHARLES WILSON, a prosperous real estate dealer, sat in his office enjoying the breeze from his electric fan. Charles was a hustling real estate agent in spite of his two hundred forty pounds. He had just returned from a long, hot drive in the country and found the fan very agreeable. He had just removed his collar and tie when a young man entered. "How are you, Harold? Have a chair."
"How are you, Mr. Wilson?"
"Just able to sit up and take nourishment. You see I am wasting away." Wilson shook his fat sides with laughter.
"I hope you will soon take on a little flesh," said Harold.
"Harold, how is architectural business?"
"The facts are that I am not doing much, but I still have hopes."
"It would be an awful world without hope. Just keep a stiff upper lip and things will come your way some of these times." Wilson's voice was so cheerful that Harold felt encouraged already.
"Why don't you make a bid for the proposed new city building?"
"I had thought of trying for this work, but I am not acquainted with the mayor and only slightly acquainted with one commissioner."
"That doesn't make any difference, if you can convince them that you can do the work."
"I have a good recommendation from the architect in whose office I was draughtsman before coming to Wilford Springs. Since I opened the office here I have designed only a few small buildings, but I am competent to design any kind of a building they want."
"Harold, you apply for the work, and I will see what I can do for you."
"Thank you. I will make application. I did not come up here to talk of my own affairs. I understand that your stenographer has quit and I want to recommend one to you."
"No, my stenographer has not quit, but she is off for a two weeks' vacation."
"I thought if you didn't have a stenographer I would make a recommendation. Do you know of anyone who does need one?"
"No, not at present. Who is the stenographer you wish to secure a position for?"
"Miss Babcock, the stenographer at the Central State Bank."
"Are you interested in stenographers in general or Miss Babcock in particular?" Wilson asked with a knowing smile.
"It's an interest in Miss Babcock in particular," admitted Harold.
"Eh, you sly fox, I thought so," said Wilson as he gave Harold a vigorous punch in the ribs. "Well, I don't blame you. If I were twenty-five years younger you might have some competition, but as I am old and fat I presume I will have to trot along in single harness, pulling the whole load by myself to the end of the road. What is the matter with the job at the bank?"
"She only gets ninety dollars a month. You know, Mr. Wilson, that that isn't enough for a good stenographer. Ruth—I mean Miss Babcock—has to support her father and aunt. They can get along on her salary, but her father was injured in an automobile accident and as a result of the injury he lost his memory. Miss Babcock is anxious to save enough money to send her father to a specialist."
"I like to see a girl like that succeed. If she is worth more than ninety dollars a month Stover should pay it to her."
"Maybe if you would make a suggestion that she should be paid more Stover would raise her salary."
"I'll find out what she can do, and if I think she should have more money I will mention it to Stover."
"Thanks, I will appreciate it and I am sure Miss Babcock will." Harold arose and walked to the door and then turned and asked, "What do you think of the Ku Klux Klan?"
"Judging from what I know of it—from sources other than the newspapers I read—I think pretty well of it."
"I do too. I hear that there is to be a lecture on 'The Klan' given in a pasture four miles west of town. What do you say? let's go."
"All right, Harold. I'm with you."
That afternoon Wilson went into the Wilford Springs Central State Bank. "How are you, Jim?"
"How are you, Charles?"
"My stenographer is off on a vacation and I need to draw up a contract. I thought perhaps I could get your stenographer to write it for me."
"Certainly," replied the obliging banker, "come right into my office and she will get it out for you." Stover and Wilson walked into the office. "Ruth," Stover said, addressing his stenographer, "Mr. Wilson wants you to draw up a contract for him."
"Yes, sir."
She sat down to a table and took down the dictation without once asking him to repeat. When he was through dictating she went into her private office to make typewritten copies. The two men remained in the president's office talking. In a short time Ruth returned and handed Wilson the contracts and returned to her office. After looking them over Wilson remarked, "Jim, that's a fine stenographer you've got."
"Yes, she's good and always on the job."
"What do you pay her?"
"Ninety dollars."
"How did you manage to get a girl like that for ninety dollars? I pay my stenographer one hundred thirty dollars, and the chances are that if she had done this work I would have had to send the work back to have one or two corrections made. If you don't pay that girl more money someone will take her away from you."
The banker smirked and rubbed his thin hands together. "I have raised her wages once since I employed her. I think a lot of Ruth, both as a stenographer and a girl. I will probably give her another raise soon. You see, Mr. Wilson, I am a special friend of her father. He got into some difficulty when president of the bank at Zala a couple of years ago, and I bought his stock to help him out, and of course I feel an interest in the girl."
"Well, I must be going."
A little way up the street Wilson met Harold King.
"I saw Jim Stover and had a talk with him about the salary of your friend. (Just brought it up incidentally.) He said that he would probably raise her salary soon. You see he is an old friend of the Babcock family."
"So I have heard."
"Her salary is a little low, but I presume Jim never thought much about it, but since it has been called to his attention, I think he will raise it."
"I thank you, Mr. Wilson."
Harold could scarcely wait for night to come when he could call on Ruth. He was anxious to get business for himself, but he was more anxious that Ruth should receive an advancement in wages, not alone because she was a dear friend, but largely because he knew she had her heart set on sending her father to a specialist. Harold didn't believe that it would do him any good. He had talked with several local doctors who had examined him and they pronounced his case as hopeless. He knew, though, that Ruth would never be satisfied until she had sent her father to Dr. Lilly.
That same evening when he called at the Babcock home he found Mr. Babcock on the porch, his head resting between his hands, his elbows on his knees. "Good evening, Mr. Babcock."
"Good evening, Mr. King. Have a chair."
"How are you feeling, Mr. Babcock?"
"I am feeling better, but not very strong yet. I worry so much because I can't remember. If I could only get my memory back I believe I would be myself again."
"Can't you remember anything that happened before the accident?"
"No, nothing; except that I had a safe with money in it, but I can't remember where the safe was. I can remember part of the combination. It was two turns to the right then to the left to forty——"
"How do you do, Harold."
"Good evening, Ruth."
"Here, take my chair, Ruth; I am going inside, if you will excuse me, Mr. King."
"Ruth," said Harold, "I have something of interest to tell you. I heard it in the early afternoon and could scarcely wait until evening."
"I have something of importance to talk to you about and am so glad you came, but first you tell me what you were going to tell of interest. You have my curiosity aroused, and you know that when a woman's curiosity is aroused she must know at once."
"Here goes, then," he said, laughing. "I have reason to believe that you are going to have your salary increased."
"That sounds good, but where did you get your information?"
Harold then told her of his conversation with Wilson and of Wilson's report that Stover would probably raise her salary soon.
"Oh, that will be fine! I thank you so much. I wouldn't have asked you and Mr. Wilson to have done so much, but since you have I certainly appreciate it. I am so anxious to see if anything can be done for father."
"Well, here is hoping that you will get a raise within the next few days."
"Will you please thank Mr. Wilson for me? What I wanted to talk to you about is the Ku Klux Klan."
"That's a common subject of conversation nowadays. I hear it being discussed everywhere on the streets."
"Mr. Stover called all the men employees of the bank into his office this evening and told them that any one and every one of them who joins the Ku Klux Klan will be discharged."
"Are you sure of that?"
"Yes, I heard two of the men speak of it after the meeting."
"What are Stover's objections to the Klan?"
"I do not know what he told the men, but I have heard him say that it is an organization of outlaws and that it is a great money-making scheme for the promoters. I told him that my grandfather had belonged to the old Ku Klux Klan in Virginia. He said that some good people had been connected with the old order but that this present organization is very different; that it has all of the vices and none of the virtues of the old order."
"He may be right, and then again he may be wrong. There is going to be a public lecture four miles west of town Friday night and I am going to hear a representative of the organization explain it."
"I don't think it will do you any harm to go and hear him, but I want you to promise me that you won't join. I have lots of confidence in Mr. Stover, and he says that when it becomes known that a man belongs to the Klan he will be branded in the community and never will have any standing again. You saw what the editor of the Journal had to say?"
"Yes, but you can't always depend on what you see in a newspaper. Springer may have been sincere in his statement that the organization is a menace to America, but again he may be hired to say that, or he might be misinformed."
"You also saw the statement of the mayor warning the public against joining the organization and telling the people that the police are amply able to enforce the laws?"
"The mayor is a politician, and politicians do not like the rise of organizations that they cannot control for political purposes, as to the enforcement of the laws—if his police force are amply able to enforce the laws they had better get busy and do it. Case after case of law violation is brought to their notice and they refuse to act."
"I was out riding with Chester Golter last night and——"
"With whom?" Harold was more interested now than he had been in her discussion of the Klan.
"Chester Golter."
"Who is Chester Golter?"
"He is our new bookkeeper, from Indiana. He is a nephew of Mr. Stover. What I started to tell you was that he said the Klan in his home town was composed of 'roughnecks' and thugs."
"They may have had a hard bunch to choose from in his home town. Ruth, I do know this, that there are numbered among the Klansmen of the country judges, congressmen, ministers, doctors, lawyers, merchants and men from every vocation. I have this on good authority. It is quite likely that much of this adverse criticism comes from people who are misinformed or are natural enemies of the Klan."
"Promise me, Harold, that you won't join."
"Ruth, I can't promise you that, until I am convinced that this organization is detrimental to the best interests of America. I want to be a hundred per cent American, and I do not want to withhold my support from an organization that is for the good of my country."
"You understand, Harold, that I am interested in you because you are my friend, and I do not want you to do anything that will impair your chances for success or injure your standing in the community."
"I appreciate your interest, and I promise you that I will have nothing to do with this organization if I find on careful investigation that it is not lawful, has unworthy purposes and is composed of bad citizens."
"I feel quite sure then you will not join, for when men like Stover condemn a movement the chances are it is dangerous and wrong."
"I hope you will have the raise before I see you again. Good night."
"Good night, Harold."
As he walked to his room he was not in a pleasant frame of mind. He was concerned about what she had told him of the attitude taken by Stover toward the Klan, but he was worried most of all about Chester Golter, the nephew of Stover. Ruth had gone riding with him. He wondered what he was like. He knew he would not like him. He was sure of that. He was a little peeved that Ruth would go riding with him when he had been in town such a short time. He was a little fearful that his relationship with Stover might have undue weight with her.