第37章 XV IN THE SHADOW OF DEATH(1)

At the appointed hour the Board of Trustees met in the hall over the post-office. The usual loungers filled the room--members of the Union, and others who had counted on a piece of the highway pie when it was cut. Dempsey, Crimmins, and Quigg sat outside the rail, against the wall. They were waiting for McGaw, who had not been seen since the afternoon.

The president was in his accustomed place. The five gentlemen of leisure, the veterinary surgeon, and the other trustees occupied their several chairs. The roll had been called, and every man had answered to his name. The occasion being one of much importance, a full board was required.

As the minute-hand neared the hour of nine Dempsey became uneasy.

He started every time a new-comer mounted the stairs. Where was McGaw? No one had seen him since he swallowed the tumblerful of whiskey and disappeared from O'Leary's, a few hours before.

The president rapped for order, and announced that the board was ready to sign the contract with Thomas Grogan for the hauling and delivery of the broken stone required for public highways.

There was no response.

"Is Mrs. Grogan here?" asked the president, looking over the room and waiting for a reply.

"Is any one here who represents her?" he repeated, after a pause, rising in his seat as he spoke.

No one answered. The only sound heard in the room was that of the heavy step of a man mounting the stairs.

"Is there any one here who can speak for Mrs. Thomas Grogan?" called the president again, in a louder voice.

"I can," said the man with the heavy tread, who proved to be the foreman at the brewery. "She won't live till mornin'; one of her horses kicked her and broke her skull, so McGaw told me."

"Broke her skull! My God! man, how do you know?" demanded the president, his voice trembling with excitement.

Every man's face was now turned toward the new-comer; a momentary thrill of horror ran through the assemblage.

"I heard it at the druggist's. One of her boys was over for medicine. Dr. Mason sewed up her head. He was drivin' by, on his way to Quarantine, when it happened."

"What Dr. Mason?" asked a trustee, eager for details.

"The man what used to be at Quarantine seven years ago. He's app'inted ag'in."

Dempsey caught up his hat and hurriedly left the room, followed by Quigg and Crimmins. McGaw, he said to himself, as he ran downstairs, must be blind drunk, not to come to the meeting.

"----him! What if he gives everything away!" he added aloud.

"This news is awful," said the president. "I am very sorry for Mrs. Grogan and her children--she was a fine woman. It is a serious matter, too, for the village. The highway work ought to commence at once; the roads need it. We may now have to advertise again. That would delay everything for a month."

"Well, there's other bids," said another trustee,--one of the gentlemen of leisure,--ignoring the president's sympathy, and hopeful now of a possible slice on his own account. "What's the matter with McGaw's proposal? There's not much difference in the price. Perhaps he would come down to the Grogan figure. Is Mr. McGaw here, or anybody who can speak for him?"

Justice Rowan sat against the wall. The overzealous trustee had exactly expressed his own wishes and anxieties. He wanted McGaw's chances settled at once. If they failed, there was Rowan's own brother who might come in for the work, the justice sharing of course in the profits.

"In the absence of me client," said Rowan, looking about the room, and drawing in his breath with an important air, "I suppose I can ripresint him. I think, however, that if your honorable boord will go on with the other business before you, Mr. McGaw will be on hand in half an hour himself. In the meantime I will hunt him up."

"I move," said the Scotch surgeon, in a voice that showed how deeply he had been affected, "that the whole matter be laid on the table for a week, until we know for certain whether poor Mrs.

Grogan is killed or not. I can hardly credit it. It is very seldom that a horse kicks a woman."

Nobody having seconded this motion, the chair did not put it. The fact was that every man was afraid to move. The majority of the trustees, who favored McGaw, were in the dark as to what effect Tom's death would have upon the bids. The law might require readvertising and hence a new competition, and perhaps somebody much worse for them than Tom might turn up and take the work--somebody living outside of the village. Then none of them would get a finger in the pie. Worse than all, the cutting of it might have to be referred to the corporation counsel, Judge Bowker. What his opinion would be was past finding out. He was beyond the reach of "pulls," and followed the law to the letter.

The minority--a minority of two, the president and the veterinary surgeon--began to distrust the spirit of McGaw's adherents. It looked to the president as if a "deal" were in the air.

The Scotchman, practical, sober-minded, sensible man as he was, had old- fashioned ideas of honesty and fair play. He had liked Tom from the first time he saw her,--he had looked after her stables professionally,--and he did not intend to see her, dead or alive, thrown out, without making a fight for her.

"I move," said he, "that the president appoint a committee of this board to jump into the nearest wagon, drive to Mrs. Grogan's, and find out whether she is still alive. If she's dead, that settles it; but if she's alive, I will protest against anything being done about this matter for ten days. It won't take twenty minutes to find out; meantime we can take up the unfinished business of the last meeting."

One of the gentlemen of leisure seconded this motion; it was carried unanimously, and this gentleman of leisure was himself appointed courier and left the room in a hurry. He had hardly reached the street when he was back again, followed closely by Dempsey, Quigg, Crimmins, Justice Rowan, and, last of all, fumbling with his fur cap, deathly pale, and entirely sober--Dan McGaw.