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I assure you, it won't be a day before you will be ashamed of having known me." T-S was gazing at the speaker, not certain whether this was something very terrible, or only a polite evasion. "Mr. Carpenter," he answered, "if all de vorld vas to give you up, I vouldn't!" Said Carpenter: "I tell you, before the cock crows again, you will deny three times that you know me."
If they dragged the prophet out from concealment, and into a police court, they would only have more excitement, more tumult, ending nobody could tell how. I called up several other people who might have influence; and meanwhile T-S was over at his office in Eternal City, pleading over the telephone with the editors of afternoon papers.
Then followed a story of which Mary Magna was the centre, with T-S and myself for background. The reporter had hunted out the Mexican family with which Carpenter had spent the night, and he drew a touching picture of Carpenter praying over Mary in this humble home, and converting her to a better life.
Inside, it is all like the sofas in Madame's scalping shop; you fall into them, and soft furs enfold you, and you give a sigh of Contentment, "O-o-o-o-o-o-oh!" "Prince's," said T-S to the chauffeur, and the palace on wheels began to glide along. It occurred to me to wonder that T-S was not embarrassed to take Carpenter to a fashionable eating-place.
We hustled Carpenter to the nearest of the busses, and put him in; the Grand Imperial Kleagle followed, and the rest of us clambered in after her. Sitting up beside the driver, watching the scene, was T-S, beaming with delight; he got me by the hand and wrung it. I could not speak, my teeth were literally chattering with excitement.
The telephone rang, and there was the voice of T-S, fairly raving. He didn't mind the "Examiner" stuff; that was good business, but that in the "Times" he was going to sue the "Times" for a million dollars, by God, and would I back him in his claim that he had not put Carpenter up to the healing business? After a bit, the magnate began apologizing for his repudiation of the prophet.
Carpenter took the money in his hand. "So this is it!" he said. He looked at it, as if he were inspecting some strange creature from the wilds of Patagonia. "It's de real stuff," said T-S, with a grin. "The stuff for which men sell their souls, and women their virtue! For which you starve and beat and torture one another " "Ain't it pretty?" said the magnate, not a bit embarrassed.
So T-S seated himself at the telephone, and asked for the managing editor of the Western City "Times," and I sat and listened to the conversation. It began with a reminder of the amount of advertising space which Eternal City consumed in the "Times" in the course of a year, and also the amount of its payroll in the community.
It was only later that I realized the part I had just been playing. It had been easy for me to recognize T-S as St. Peter, but I had not known myself as that rich young man who had asked for advice, and then rejected it. "When he heard this, he was very sorrowful; for he was very rich." Yes, I had found my place in the story!
Carpenter, followed by T-S and the secretary and myself, went down the line of tables, shaking hands with many on the way, and being patted on the back by others. Also T-S shook hands, and was patted. Seats were found for us, and food was brought double portions of it, as if to make the plight of the poor magnate even more absurd!
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