Part of it I got then, and part of it later, but I might as well tell it all at once and be done with it.  It happened that at the restaurant where Old Joe and I had dined before we went to the mass-meeting, he had met a girl whom he knew too well, after the fashion of young men about town.  In greeting her on the way out, he had told her he was going to hear the new prophet and had laughingly suggested that the meeting was free.  The girl, out of idle curiosity, had come, and had been touched by Carpenter’s physical, if not by his moral charms.  It chanced that this girl was living with a man who stood high in the secret service department of “big business” in our city; so she had got the full story of what was being planned against Carpenter.  That afternoon, it appeared, there had been a meeting between Algernon de Wiggs, president of our Chamber of Commerce, and Westerly, secretary of our “M. and M.,” and Gerald Carson, organizer of our “Boosters’ League.”  These three had put up six thousand dollars, and turned it over to their secret service agents, with instructions that Carpenter’s agitations in Western City were to be ended inside of twenty-four hours.

A plan had been worked out, every detail of which had been phoned to Old Joe.  A group of ex-service men, members of the Brigade, had been hired to seize the prophet and treat him to a tar and feathering.  It had not taken much to move them to action, for the afternoon papers were full of accounts of Carpenter’s speech on Main Street, his denunciation of war, and of soldiers as “murderers” and “wolves.”

But that was not all, said Old Joe; and I saw that his hand was trembling as he spoke.  It appeared that there was an “operative” named Hamby, who was one of Carpenter’s followers.

“By God!” I burst out, in sudden fury.  “I was sure that fellow was a crook!”

“Yes,” said the other.  “He’s been telephoning in regular reports as to Carpenter’s doings.  And now it’s been arranged that he is to put an infernal machine in the Socialist headquarters where Carpenter has been staying!”

I was almost speechless.  “You mean—­to blow them up?”

“No, to blow up their reputations.  Hamby is to lure Carpenter out to the street, and when the gang grabs him, Hamby will fire a shot, and there will be three or four secret agents in the crowd, who will incite the others, and see to it that Carpenter is lynched instead of being tarred and feathered!”

LIV

So there was the layout; and now, what was to be done?  The first thing was to call Abell on the phone, and see if anything had happened.  I picked up the receiver; but alas, the report was, “No answer.”  I urged “central” to try several times, but all I could get was, “I am ringing them.”  Carpenter, no doubt, was praying.  What were the others doing?  I kept on trying, but finally gave up.

Could the mob have taken them away?  But Old Joe answered, no, a definite hour had been set.  The ex-service men were to gather on the stroke of midnight.  We had nearly an hour yet.