Part 71

"It's begun! It's begun! The war is on!" said Hobart, gleefully. "I hear the dropping bullets of the skirmishers!"

"Hobart, you'd exult over an earthquake!" exclaimed Harley, wrathfully.

But he knew Hobart's words to be true, and presently he drifted back to Jimmy Grayson.

"Mr. Harley is my intimate personal friend," said the candidate to some of the members of the committee who looked askance at the correspondent; "and what you say before me you can say before him. He knows what to print and what not to print."

"It is this," said Mr. Goodnight, and Mr. Crayon nodded violently in affirmation; "all the news shows that this tariff agitation is growing fast. But it is only a trick of the enemy to force an expression from us. They are united in favor of the tariff and we are not. There is a division within our ranks. Many of us, and I may say it is the more solid and conservative wing of the party, the men who really understand the world, know that it is not wise to meddle with the question. Leave well enough alone. We are interested in this ourselves, and, as you know, we furnish the sinews of war."

He stopped and coughed significantly, and Mr. Crayon also coughed significantly. The remaining members of the committee did likewise. Jimmy Grayson looked thoughtful.

"Gentlemen," he said, "I confess to you that my mind has been upon this subject for several days past."

"But you will listen to advice," said Mr. Goodnight, hastily.

"Certainly! Certainly!" said Jimmy Grayson. "But you see the time is coming when I must decide upon some course in regard to it. I appreciate the self-sacrifice of you gentlemen in leaving your business interests to come so far, and I shall be glad if we can co-operate. We reach Philipsburg to-night; I make a speech there, but it will be over early. Suppose we have our talk immediately afterwards."

The committee at once accepted the offer and expressed satisfaction. Mr. Grayson showed every sign of tractability, and they began to feel again that their valuable time had not been expended in vain.

Harley told Sylvia that the affair was now bound to come to a head very soon, but she repeated her confidence in her uncle.

Hobart, however, was gloomy; his joy of the morning seemed to have passed quickly.

"I don't like it," he remarked to Harley. "Jimmy Grayson seems to have followed the lead of these men without once saying: 'I am the nominee and it is for me to say.'"

"And why not? Every dictate of prudence requires that he should. What is the use of taking up such a troublesome question at this late day of the campaign?"

"But there will be no fight!" This was said very plaintively.

Harley smiled.

"I sincerely hope we will escape one," he said.

Mr. Grayson, after the brief talk, retired to his state-room, and for a long time did not see anybody. Harley knew that he was thinking deeply, and when the time came for the next speech at another way-station, he followed close behind and was keenly watchful.

Again the members of the committee arranged themselves on the stage in a formidable semicircle behind the speaker, and surveyed the audience with an air that bore a tinge of weary disdain. They were in one of the most barren parts of the country, a section that could never be developed into anything great, and Mr. Crayon looked upon a speech there as a sheer waste of time.

The candidate spoke upon many important issues, and then he began to skirmish gingerly around the edge of one that hitherto had been permitted to slumber quietly. He did not show any wish to make a direct attack, just a desire to worry and tease, as it were, a disposition to fire a few shots, more for the sake of creating an alarm than to do damage.

The committee at once felt apprehension. This was forbidden ground. The candidate was growing entirely too frivolous; he should be reminded of his duty to the country and to great business interests. Yet they could do nothing at the moment; Mr. Grayson was speaking, and it was impossible to interrupt him.

But Harley, attentive and knowing everything that passed in their minds, enjoyed their uneasiness. He saw them quiver and shrink, and then grow angry, as Mr. Grayson skirmished closer and closer to the forbidden ground, that area sown with traps and pitfalls, in which many a man has broken his political limbs, yea, has even lost his political life. He watched the massive Mr. Goodnight as he swelled with importance and indignation. He knew that the great manufacturer was on pins to get at the candidate, to tell him the terrible mistake that he was so near to making, and perhaps to lecture him a little on the indiscretions of youth and inexperience. But, perforce, he remained silent until Mr. Grayson concluded, and then as the crowd was leaving, he approached him. The candidate seemed to be in a light and joyous humor, and he lifted his hand in a gesture that was a dismissal of care.

"Remember our coming conference to-night, Mr. Goodnight," he said. "We will discuss everything then."

He smiled as he spoke, and walked on, but Mr. Goodnight felt himself waved aside in a manner that was not pleasing to his sense of dignity; he was sixty years old, and he had done great things in the world.

Harley and Hobart saw it all, and light began to appear on Hobart's gloomy countenance.

"Harley," he said, "I believe that after all my first intuition was correct. We may yet have trouble."

Harley was not so sure. It seemed to him that the affair, which was really not an affair, merely the bud and promise of one, could be adjusted, especially in these shortening days of the campaign. Tact would do it, and he was full of hope.

The members of the committee went into their private car and were inhospitable the remainder of the day; apparently they wished to be alone, and no one was inclined to violate their wish. Harley supposed that they were in conference, and he was correct.