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54-40 OR FIGHT

by

EMERSON HOUGH

Author of _The Mississippi Bubble_, _The Way of the Man_, etc.

With Four Illustrations by Arthur I. Keller

A. L. Burt Company
Publishers New York

1909







[Illustration: "Madam," said I, "let me, at least, alone." Page 49]




TO
Theodore Roosevelt

PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES
AND FIRM BELIEVER IN THE RULE OF THE PEOPLE

THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED
WITH THE LOYALTY AND ADMIRATION
OF THE AUTHOR




CONTENTS


CHAPTER

I THE MAKERS OF MAPS
II BY SPECIAL DESPATCH
III IN ARGUMENT
IV THE BARONESS HELENA
V ONE OF THE WOMEN IN THE CASE
VI THE BOUDOIR OF THE BARONESS
VII REGARDING ELISABETH
VIII MR. CALHOUN ACCEPTS
IX A KETTLE OF FISH
X MIXED DUTIES
XI WHO GIVETH THIS WOMAN
XII THE MARATHON
XIII ON SECRET SERVICE
XIV THE OTHER WOMAN
XV WITH MADAM THE BARONESS
XVI DEJEUNER A LA FOURCHETTE
XVII A HUNTER OF BUTTERFLIES
XVIII THE MISSING SLIPPER
XIX THE GENTLEMAN FROM TENNESSEE
XX THE LADY FROM MEXICO
XXI POLITICS UNDER COVER
XXII BUT YET A WOMAN
XXIII SUCCESS IN SILK
XXIV THE WHOA-HAW TRAIL
XXV OREGON
XXVI THE DEBATED COUNTRY
XXVII IN THE CABIN OF MADAM
XXVIII WHEN A WOMAN WOULD
XXIX IN EXCHANGE
XXX COUNTER CURRENTS
XXXI THE PAYMENT
XXXII PAKENHAM'S PRICE
XXXIII THE STORY OF HELENA VON RITZ
XXXIV THE VICTORY
XXXV THE PROXY OF PAKENHAM
XXXVI THE PALO ALTO BALL
EPILOGUE





CHAPTER I

THE MAKERS OF MAPS

There is scarcely a single cause in which a woman is not engaged in
some way fomenting the suit.--_Juvenal_.


"Then you offer me no hope, Doctor?" The gray mane of Doctor Samuel Ward
waved like a fighting crest as he made answer:

"Not the sort of hope you ask." A moment later he added: "John, I am
ashamed of you."

The cynical smile of the man I called my chief still remained upon his
lips, the same drawn look of suffering still remained upon his gaunt
features; but in his blue eye I saw a glint which proved that the answer
of his old friend had struck out some unused spark of vitality from the
deep, cold flint of his heart.

"I never knew you for a coward, Calhoun," went on Doctor Ward, "nor any
of your family I give you now the benefit of my personal acquaintance
with this generation of the Calhouns. I ask something more of you than
faint-heartedness."

The keen eyes turned upon him again with the old flame of flint which a
generation had known--a generation, for the most part, of enemies. On my
chief's face I saw appear again the fighting flush, proof of his
hard-fibered nature, ever ready to rejoin with challenge when challenge
came.

"Did not Saul fall upon his own sword?" asked John Calhoun. "Have not
devoted leaders from the start of the world till now sometimes rid the
scene of the responsible figures in lost fights, the men on whom blame
rested for failures?"

"Cowards!" rejoined Doctor Ward. "Cowards, every one of them! Were there
not other swords upon which they might have fallen--those of their
enemies?"

"It is not my own hand--my own sword, Sam," said Calhoun. "Not that. You
know as well as I that I am already marked and doomed, even as I sit at
my table to-night. A walk of a wet night here in Washington--a turn
along the Heights out there when the winter wind is keen--yes, Sam, I
see my grave before me, close enough; but how can I rest easy in that
grave? Man, we have not yet dreamed how great a country this may be. We
_must_ have Texas. We _must_ have also Oregon. We must have--"

"Free?" The old doctor shrugged his shoulders and smiled at the arch
pro-slavery exponent.

"Then, since you mention it, yes!" retorted Calhoun fretfully. "But I
shall not go into the old argument of those who say that black is white,
that South is North. It is only for my own race that I plan a wider
America. But then--" Calhoun raised a long, thin hand. "Why," he went on
slowly, "I have just told you that I have failed. And yet you, my old
friend, whom I ought to trust, condemn me to live on!"

Doctor Samuel Ward took snuff again, but all the answer he made was to
waggle his gray mane and stare hard at the face of the other.

"Yes," said he, at length, "I condemn you to fight on, John;" and he
smiled grimly.

"Why, look at you, man!" he broke out fiercely, after a moment. "The
type and picture of combat! Good bone, fine bone and hard; a hard head
and bony; little eye, set deep; strong, wiry muscles, not too
big--fighting muscles, not dough; clean limbs; strong fingers; good
arms, legs, neck; wide chest--"

"Then you give me hope?" Calhoun flashed a smile at him.

"No, sir! If you do your duty, there is no hope for you to live. If you
do not do your duty, there is no hope for you to die, John Calhoun, for
more than two years to come--perhaps five years--six. Keep up this
work--as you must, my friend--and you die as surely as though I shot you
through as you sit there. Now, is this any comfort to you?"

A gray pallor overspread my master's face. That truth is welcome to no
man, morbid or sane, sound or ill; but brave men meet it as this one
did.

"Time to do much!" he murmured to himself. "Time to mend many broken
vessels, in those two years. One more fight--yes, let us have it!"

But Calhoun the man was lost once more in Calhoun the visionary, the
fanatic statesman. He summed up, as though to himself, something of the
situation which then existed at Washington.

"Yes, the coast is clearer, now that Webster is out of the cabinet, but
Mr. Upshur's death last month brings in new complications. Had he
remained our secretary of state, much might have been done. It was only
last October he proposed to Texas a treaty of annexation."

"Yes, and found Texas none so eager," frowned Doctor Ward.

"No; and why not? You and I know well enough. Sir Richard Pakenham, the
English plenipotentiary here, could tell if he liked. _England_ is busy
with Texas. Texas owes large funds to _England. England_ wants Texas as
a colony. There is fire under this smoky talk of Texas dividing into two
governments, one, at least, under England's gentle and unselfish care!

"And now, look you," Calhoun continued, rising, and pacing up and down,
"look what is the evidence. Van Zandt, _charge d'affaires_ in Washington
for the Republic of Texas, wrote Secretary Upshur only a month before
Upshur's death, and told him to go carefully or he would drive Mexico to
resume the war, _and so cost Texas the friendship of England!_ Excellent
Mr. Van Zandt! I at least know what the friendship of England means. So,
he asks us if we will protect Texas with troops and ships in case she
_does_ sign that agreement of annexation. Cunning Mr. Van Zandt! He
knows what that answer must be to-day, with England ready to fight us
for Texas and Oregon both, and we wholly unready for war. Cunning Mr.
Van Zandt, covert friend of England! And lucky Mr. Upshur, who was
killed, and so never had to make that answer!"

"But, John, another will have to make it, the one way or the other,"
said his friend.

"Yes!" The long hand smote on the table.

"President Tyler has offered you Mr. Upshur's portfolio as secretary of
state?"

"Yes!" The long hand smote again.

Doctor Ward made no comment beyond a long whistle, as he recrossed his
legs. His eyes were fixed on Calhoun's frowning face. "There will be
events!" said he at length, grinning.

"I have not yet accepted," said Calhoun. "If I do, it will be to bring
Texas and Oregon into this Union, one slave, the other free, but both
vast and of a mighty future for us. That done, I resign at once."

"Will you accept?"

Calhoun's answer was first to pick up a paper from his desk. "See, here
is the despatch Mr. Pakenham brought from Lord Aberdeen of the British
ministry to Mr. Upshur just two days before his death. Judge whether
Aberdeen wants liberty--or territory! In effect he reasserts England's
right to interfere in our affairs. We fought one war to disprove that.
England has said enough on this continent. And England has meddled
enough."

Calhoun and Ward looked at each other, sober in their realization of the
grave problems which then beset American statesmanship and American
thought. The old doctor was first to break the silence. "Then do you
accept? Will you serve again, John?"

"Listen to me. If I do accept, I shall take Mr. Upshur's and Mr.
Nelson's place only on one condition--yes, if I do, here is what _I_
shall say to England regarding Texas. I shall show her what a Monroe
Doctrine is; shall show her that while Texas is small and weak, Texas
_and_ this republic are not. This is what I have drafted as a possible
reply. I shall tell Mr. Pakenham that his chief's avowal of intentions
has made it our _imperious duty_, in self-defense, to hasten the
annexation of Texas, cost what it may, mean what it may! John Calhoun
does not shilly-shally.

"_That_ will be my answer," repeated my chief at last. Again they looked
gravely, each into the other's eye, each knowing what all this might
mean.

"Yes, I shall have Texas, as I shall have Oregon, settled before I lay
down my arms, Sam Ward. No, I am _not_ yet ready to die!" Calhoun's old
fire now flamed in all his mien.

"The situation is extremely difficult," said his friend slowly. "It must
be done; but how? We are as a nation not ready for war. You as a
statesman are not adequate to the politics of all this. Where is your
political party, John? You have none. You have outrun all parties. It
will be your ruin, that you have been honest!"

Calhoun turned on him swiftly. "You know as well as I that mere politics
will not serve. It will take some extraordinary measure--you know
men--and, perhaps, _women_."

"Yes," said Doctor Ward, "and a precious silly lot: they are; the two
running after each other and forgetting each other; using and wasting
each other; ruining and despoiling each other, all the years, from Troy
to Rome! But yes! For a man, set a woman for a trap. _Vice versa_, I
suppose?"

Calhoun nodded, with a thin smile. "As it chances, I need a man. Ergo,
and very plainly, I must use a woman!"

They looked at each other for a moment. That Calhoun planned some
deep-laid stratagem was plain, but his speech for the time remained
enigmatic, even to his most intimate companion.

"There are two women in our world to-day," said Calhoun. "As to Jackson,
the old fool was a monogamist, and still is. Not so much so Jim Polk of
Tennessee. Never does he appear in public with eyes other than for the
Dona Lucrezia of the Mexican legation! Now, one against the
other--Mexico against Austria--"

Doctor Ward raised his eyebrows in perplexity.

"That is to say, England, and _not_ Austria," went on Calhoun coldly.
"The ambassadress of England to America was born in Budapest! So I say,
Austria; or perhaps Hungary, or some other country, which raised this
strange representative who has made some stir in Washington here these
last few weeks."

"Ah, _you mean the baroness!_" exclaimed Doctor Ward. "Tut! Tut!"

Calhoun nodded, with the same cold, thin smile. "Yes," he said, "I mean
Mr. Pakenham's reputed mistress, his assured secret agent and spy, the
beautiful Baroness von Ritz!"

He mentioned a name then well known in diplomatic and social life, when
intrigue in Washington, if not open, was none too well hidden.

"Gay Sir Richard!" he resumed. "You know, his ancestor was a
brother-in-law of the Duke of Wellington. He himself seems to have
absorbed some of the great duke's fondness for the fair. Before he came
to us he was with England's legation in Mexico. 'Twas there he first met
the Dona Lucrezia. 'Tis said he would have remained in Mexico had it not
been arranged that she and her husband, Senor Yturrio, should accompany
General Almonte in the Mexican ministry here. On _these_ conditions, Sir
Richard agreed to accept promotion as minister plenipotentiary to
Washington!"

"That was nine years ago," commented Doctor Ward.

"Yes; and it was only last fall that he was made envoy extraordinary. He
is at least an extraordinary envoy! Near fifty years of age, he seems to
forget public decency; he forgets even the Dona Lucrezia, leaving her to
the admiration of Mr. Polk and Mr. Van Zandt, and follows off after the
sprightly Baroness von Ritz. Meantime, Senor Yturrio _also_
forgets the Dona Lucrezia, and proceeds _also_ to follow after the
baroness--although with less hope than Sir Richard, as they say! At
least Pakenham has taste! The Baroness von Ritz has brains and beauty
both. It is _she_ who is England's real envoy. Now, I believe she knows
England's real intentions as to Texas."

Doctor Ward screwed his lips for a long whistle, as he contemplated John
Calhoun's thin, determined face.

"I do not care at present to say more," went on my chief; "but do you
not see, granted certain motives, Polk might come into power pledged to
the extension of our Southwest borders--"

"Calhoun, are you mad?" cried his friend. "Would you plunge this country
into war? Would you pit two peoples, like cocks on a floor? And would
you use women in our diplomacy?"

Calhoun now was no longer the friend, the humanitarian. He was the
relentless machine; the idea; the single purpose, which to the world at
large he had been all his life in Congress, in cabinets, on this or the
other side of the throne of American power. He spoke coldly as he went
on:

"In these matters it is not a question of means, but of results. If war
comes, let it come; although I hope it will not come. As to the use of
women--tell me, _why not women?_ Why anything _else_ but women? It is
only playing life against life; one variant against another. That is
politics, my friend. I _want_ Pakenham. So, I must learn what _Pakenham_
wants! Does he want Texas for England, or the Baroness von Ritz _for
himself?_"

Ward still sat and looked at him. "My God!" said he at last, softly; but
Calhoun went on:

"Why, who has made the maps of the world, and who has written pages in
its history? Who makes and unmakes cities and empires and republics
to-day? _Woman_, and not man! Are you so ignorant--and you a physician,
who know them both? Gad, man, you do not understand your own profession,
and yet you seek to counsel me in mine!"

"Strange words from you, John," commented his friend, shaking his head;
"not seemly for a man who stands where you stand to-day."

"Strange weapons--yes. If I could always use my old weapons of tongue
and brain, I would not need these, perhaps. Now you tell me my time is
short. I must fight now to win. I have never fought to lose. I can not
be too nice in agents and instruments."

The old doctor rose and took a turn up and down the little room, one of
Calhoun's modest menage at the nation's capital, which then was not the
city it is to-day. Calhoun followed him with even steps.

"Changes of maps, my friend? Listen to me. The geography of America for
the next fifty years rests under a little roof over in M Street
to-night--a roof which Sir Richard secretly maintains. The map of the
United States, I tell you, is covered with a down counterpane _a deux_,
to-night. You ask me to go on with my fight. I answer, first I must find
the woman. Now, I say, I have found her, as you know. Also, I have told
you _where_ I have found her. Under a counterpane! Texas, Oregon, these
United States under a counterpane!"

Doctor Ward sighed, as he shook his head. "I don't pretend to know now
all you mean."

Calhoun whirled on him fiercely, with a vigor which his wasted frame did
not indicate as possible.

"Listen, then, and I will tell you what John Calhoun means--John
Calhoun, who has loved his own state, who has hated those who hated him,
who has never prayed for those who despitefully used him, who has fought
and will fight, since all insist on that. It is true Tyler has offered
me again to-day the portfolio of secretary of state. Shall I take it? If
I do, it means that I am employed by this administration to secure the
admission of Texas. Can you believe me when I tell you that my ambition
is for it all--_all_, every foot of new land, west to the Pacific, that
we can get, slave _or_ free? Can you believe John Calhoun, pro-slavery
advocate and orator all his life, when he says that he believes he is an
humble instrument destined, with God's aid, and through the use of such
instruments as our human society affords, to build, _not_ a wider slave
country, but a wider America?"

"It would be worth the fight of a few years more, Calhoun," gravely
answered his old friend. "I admit I had not dreamed this of you."

"History will not write it of me, perhaps," went on my chief. "But you
tell me to fight, and now I shall fight, and in my own way. I tell you,
that answer shall go to Pakenham. And I tell you, Pakenham shall not
_dare_ take offense at me. War with Mexico we possibly, indeed
certainly, shall have. War on the Northwest, too, we yet may have
unless--" He paused; and Doctor Ward prompted him some moments later, as
he still remained in thought.

"Unless what, John? What do you mean--still hearing the rustle of
skirts?"

"Yes!--unless the celebrated Baroness Helena von Ritz says otherwise!"
replied he grimly.

"How dignified a diplomacy have we here! You plan war between two
embassies on the distaff side!" smiled Doctor Ward.

Calhoun continued his walk. "I do not say so," he made answer; "but, if
there must be war, we may reflect that war is at its best when woman
_is_ in the field!"




CHAPTER II

BY SPECIAL DESPATCH

In all eras and all climes a woman of great genius or beauty has
done what she chose.--_Ouido_.


"Nicholas," said Calhoun, turning to me suddenly, but with his
invariable kindliness of tone, "oblige me to-night. I have written a
message here. You will see the address--"

"I have unavoidably heard this lady's name," I hesitated.

"You will find the lady's name above the seal. Take her this message
from me. Yes, your errand is to bring the least known and most talked of
woman in Washington, alone, unattended save by yourself, to a
gentleman's apartments, to his house, at a time past the hour of
midnight! That gentleman is myself! You must not take any answer in the
negative."

As I sat dumbly, holding this sealed document in my hand, he turned to
Doctor Ward, with a nod toward myself.

"I choose my young aide, Mr. Trist here, for good reasons. He is just
back from six months in the wilderness, and may be shy; but once he had
a way with women, so they tell me--and you know, in approaching the
question _ad feminam_ we operate _per hominem_."

Doctor Ward took snuff with violence as he regarded me critically.

"I do not doubt the young man's sincerity and faithfulness," said he. "I
was only questioning one thing."

"Yes?"

"His age."

Calhoun rubbed his chin. "Nicholas," said he, "you heard me. I have no
wish to encumber you with useless instructions. Your errand is before
you. Very much depends upon it, as you have heard. All I can say is,
keep your head, keep your feet, and keep your heart!"

The two older men both turned now, and smiled at me in a manner not
wholly to my liking. Neither was this errand to my liking.

It was true, I was hardly arrived home after many months in the West;
but I had certain plans of my own for that very night, and although as
yet I had made no definite engagement with my fiancee, Miss Elisabeth
Churchill, of Elmhurst Farm, for meeting her at the great ball this
night, such certainly was my desire and my intention. Why, I had scarce
seen Elisabeth twice in the last year.

"How now, Nick, my son?" began my chief. "Have staff and scrip been your
portion so long that you are wholly wedded to them? Come, I think the
night might promise you something of interest. I assure you of one
thing--you will receive no willing answer from the fair baroness. She
will scoff at you, and perhaps bid you farewell. See to it, then; do
what you like, but bring her _with_ you, and bring her _here_.

"You will realize the importance of all this when I tell you that my
answer to Mr. Tyler must be in before noon to-morrow. That answer will
depend upon the answer the Baroness von Ritz makes to _me_, here,
to-night! I can not go to her, so she must come to me. You have often
served me well, my son. Serve me to-night. My time is short; I have no
moves to lose. It is you who will decide before morning whether or not
John Calhoun is the next secretary of state. And that will decide
whether or not Texas is to be a state." I had never seen Mr. Calhoun so
intent, so absorbed.

We all three now sat silent in the little room where the candles
guttered in the great glass _cylindres_ on the mantel--an apartment
scarce better lighted by the further aid of lamps fed by oil.

"He might be older," said Calhoun at length, speaking of me as though I
were not present. "And 'tis a hard game to play, if once my lady Helena
takes it into her merry head to make it so for him. But if I sent one
shorter of stature and uglier of visage and with less art in approaching
a crinoline--why, perhaps he would get no farther than her door. No; he
will serve--he _must_ serve!"

He arose now, and bowed to us both, even as I rose and turned for my
cloak to shield me from the raw drizzle which then was falling in the
streets. Doctor Ward reached down his own shaggy top hat from the rack.

"To bed with you now, John," said he sternly.

"No, I must write."

"You heard me say, to bed with you! A stiff toddy to make you sleep.
Nicholas here may wake you soon enough with his mysterious companion. I
think to-morrow will be time enough for you to work, and to-morrow very
likely will bring work for you to do."

Calhoun sighed. "God!" he exclaimed, "if I but had back my strength! If
there were more than those scant remaining years!"

"Go!" said he suddenly; and so we others passed down his step and out
into the semi-lighted streets.

So this, then, was my errand. My mind still tingled at its unwelcome
quality. Doctor Ward guessed something of my mental dissatisfaction.

"Never mind, Nicholas," said he, as we parted at the street corner,
where he climbed into the rickety carriage which his colored driver held
awaiting him. "Never mind. I don't myself quite know what Calhoun wants;
but he would not ask of you anything personally improper. Do his errand,
then. It is part of your work. In any case--" and I thought I saw him
grin in the dim light--"you may have a night which you will remember."

There proved to be truth in what he said.




CHAPTER III

IN ARGUMENT

The egotism of women is always for two.--_Mme. De Staeel_.


The thought of missing my meeting with Elisabeth still rankled in my
soul. Had it been another man who asked me to carry this message, I must
have refused. But this man was my master, my chief, in whose service I
had engaged.

Strange enough it may seem to give John Calhoun any title showing love
or respect. To-day most men call him traitor--call him the man
responsible for the war between North and South--call him the arch
apostle of that impossible doctrine of slavery, which we all now admit
was wrong. Why, then, should I love him as I did? I can not say, except
that I always loved, honored and admired courage, uprightness,
integrity.

For myself, his agent, I had, as I say, left the old Trist homestead at
the foot of South Mountain in Maryland, to seek my fortune in our
capital city. I had had some three or four years' semi-diplomatic
training when I first met Calhoun and entered his service as assistant.
It was under him that I finished my studies in law. Meantime, I was his
messenger in very many quests, his source of information in many matters
where he had no time to go into details.

Strange enough had been some of the circumstances in which I found
myself thrust through this relation with a man so intimately connected
for a generation with our public life. Adventures were always to my
liking, and surely I had my share. I knew the frontier marches of
Tennessee and Alabama, the intricacies of politics of Ohio and New York,
mixed as those things were in Tyler's time. I had even been as far west
as the Rockies, of which young Fremont was now beginning to write so
understandingly. For six months I had been in Mississippi and Texas
studying matters and men, and now, just hack from Natchitoches, I felt
that I had earned some little rest.

But there was the fascination of it--that big game of politics. No, I
will call it by its better name of statesmanship, which sometimes it
deserved in those days, as it does not to-day. That was a day of
Warwicks. The nominal rulers did not hold the greatest titles.
Naturally, I knew something of these things, from the nature of my work
in Calhoun's office. I have had insight into documents which never
became public. I have seen treaties made. I have seen the making of
maps go forward. This, indeed, I was in part to see that very night, and
curiously, too.

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