One evening three weeks after the great murder trial
McGregor took a long walk in the streets of Chicago
and tried to plan out his life. He was troubled
and disconcerted by the event that had crowded in upon
the heels of his dramatic success in the court room
and more than troubled by the fact that his mind constantly
played with the dream of having Margaret Ormsby as
his wife. In the city he had become a power and
instead of the names and the pictures of criminals
and keepers of disorderly houses his name and his
picture now appeared on the front pages of newspapers.
Andrew Leffingwell, the political representative in
Chicago of a rich and successful publisher of sensational
newspapers, had visited him in his office and had proposed
to make him a political figure in the city. Finley
a noted criminal lawyer had offered him a partnership.
The lawyer, a small smiling man with white teeth,
had not asked McGregor for an immediate decision.
In a way he had taken the decision for granted.
Smiling genially and rolling a cigar across McGregor’s
desk he had spent an hour telling stories of famous
court room triumphs.
“One such triumph is enough to make a man,”
he declared. “You have no idea how far
such a success will carry you. The word of it
keeps running through men’s minds. A tradition
is built up. The remembrance of it acts upon
the minds of jurors. Cases are won for you by
the mere connection of your name with the case.”
McGregor walked slowly and heavily through the streets
without seeing the people. In Wabash Avenue near
Twenty-third Street he stopped in a saloon and drank
beer. The saloon was in a room below the level
of the sidewalk and the floor was covered with sawdust.
Two half drunken labourers stood by the bar quarrelling.
One of the labourers who was a socialist continually
cursed the army and his words started McGregor to
thinking of the dream he had so long held and that
now seemed fading. “I was in the army and
I know what I am talking about,” declared the
socialist. “There is nothing national about
the army. It is a privately owned thing.
Here it is secretly owned by the capitalists and in
Europe by the aristocracy. Don’t tell me—I
know. The army is made up of bums. If I’m
a bum I became one then. You will see fast enough
what fellows are in the army if the country is ever
caught and drawn into a great war.”
Becoming excited the socialist raised his voice and
pounded on the bar. “Hell, we don’t
know ourselves at all,” he cried. “We
never have been tested. We call ourselves a great
nation because we are rich. We are like a fat
boy who has had too much pie. Yes sir—that’s
what we are here in America and as far as our army
goes it is a fat boy’s plaything. Keep
away from it.”
McGregor sat in the corner of the saloon and looked
about. Men came in and went out at the door.
A child carried a pail down the short flight of steps
from the street and ran across the sawdust floor.
Her voice, thin and sharp, pierced through the babble
of men’s voices. “Ten cents’
worth—give me plenty,” she pleaded,
raising the pail above her head and putting it on
the bar.
Copyrights
Marching Men from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.
