"The law obliges us to canvass returns in executive session, Morrison."

"I say nothing against the business you have done there," proceeded
Morrison, inexorably. "I can't say anything. I don't know what has been
done. I'm in no position, therefore, to criticize. If I did know I'd
probably have, good reason to praise you state managers as good and
faithful servants of our people. But the people don't know. You have left
'em to guess. It's their business. It's bad policy to keep folks guessing
when their own business is concerned. What's the matter with throwing wide
the doors to-morrow and saying 'Come along in, people, and we'll talk this
over'?"

"That's admitting the mob to riot, to intimidate, to rule!"

"Impractical--wholly impractical, Stewart," the Senator chided.

Calvin Dow came toward the group, stuffing his spectacles back into their
case. Given a decoration for his coat lapel, the Hon. Calvin Dow, with his
white mustache and his imperial, would have served for an excellent model
in a study of a marshal of France. His intrusion, if such it was, was not
resented; with his old-school manners and his gentle voice he was the
embodiment of apology that demanded acceptance. "Jodrey, you never said a
truer word. As old politicians, you and I, we understand just how
impractical such an idea is. But I must be allowed to put the emphasis
very decidedly on the word 'old.' There seems to be something new in the
air all of a sudden."

"Yes, a fresh crop of moonshiners in politics," was the Senator's acrid
response. "And the stuff they're putting out is as raw and dangerous as