asking to be excused.

"I reckon he ain't entirely over that wound," Corwin told an intimate
friend. "We'll have to get along without him, this time." But there was
a light in Corwin's eyes which told that he was not unaware of the
significance of Lawler's trip to the capital with McGregor.

There came a day when Corwin and his brother-delegates got on a train at
Willets and were taken to the capital. And there came another day when
they returned. They brought a brass band with them; and Willets closed
its doors and went out into the street--and crowded the station
platform, where the band was playing, and where the returned delegates,
frenzied with joy, were shrieking above the din: "Hurrah for Kane
Lawler! Lawler--our next governor! Hip, hip--HOORRAY!"

"We swamped 'em!" howled a crimson-faced enthusiast; "there was nothin'
to it! Unanimous after the first vote! HOORRAY!"

In his office, Gary Warden heard the shouting; saw the crowd, and
listened to the cheers. He stood at one of the windows, balefully
watching; sneering at the delegates who had returned, flushed with
victory. Singleton, scowling, stood beside Warden.

They saw half a dozen men draw apart from the others. Later the
men--delegates, from the gay badges appended to them--rode out of town,
southward.

"Reception committee," sneered Warden. "They're going to escort Lawler
to town. Let's go to the Two Diamond. I'll be damned if I want to be in
town to watch Lawler grin when he sees that crowd! There's a dozen big
guns in that bunch, who have come down from the capital to watch the
fun. Well, it's no fun for me!"

However, it was "fun" for the delighted citizens of Willets, who, some
hours later, saw the reception committee returning with Lawler. They
escorted him to a platform which had been erected in the middle of the
street in the absence of the reception committee, where, after the crowd
had cheered him many times, Lawler made his first speech as the
candidate of his party.

Energetic citizens had gayly decorated the street with flags and
bunting--taking Corwin's entire stock--and the varicolored decorations
swathed the town from end to end.

Warden and Singleton had scurried out of town long before the coming of
Lawler. But Jimmy Singleton, with a number of other children who had
mercifully been dismissed by the school teacher, were close to the
platform during the celebration.

"He's gonna be governor, Jimmy," whispered one of Jimmy's comp