owed Barry to
proceed.

"Why, yes, we passed the old thing. I always said we would. Your friend
Percival voted with the combine. He's the real stuff. When he saw how
truth and justice lay, he buckled down and did the square thing. Have a
cigar? No? Oh yes, it's straight goods I'm givin' you. You needn't look
so queer. And say, on the quiet, I'm rather stuck on you reform
fellers. All they need is argument. So when you get 'em, you get 'em
cheap. Say, it's better than cash, any day."

Norris ran up the steps and snatched a morning's paper. Yes, it was
true. Percival had voted against his friends and had given the victory
to the other side. Ellery flung into his office and whirled into his
day's work in a kind of daze. There was much to do and no time for
outside thought, but when the afternoon was over, instead of rushing
back to the little home, as he had expected, Norris hurried into his
coat and hastened to find Dick. Mr. Percival was at home; and, without
waiting to be announced, Ellery sprang up the stairs to the little
sanctum where the two had confabbed on many a day. He plunged in on
Dick, pale and unresponsive, and blurted out his question.

"Yes," said Dick, "I voted for it. I became convinced that it was the
best thing the city could do. I've been telling the boys so for the past
two weeks. I really didn't understand the matter before. Don't get so
excited, Norris."

He spoke quietly, but without meeting his friend's eyes, and Ellery's
heart sank.

"I don't know what it means, Dick," he said bitterly, "but it seems to
me that, like Lucifer, you've been falling from dawn to dewy eve, and
now you are likely to consort with the devils in the pit. Are you the
old Dick who used to be my idol?"

"Oh, bosh!" said Dick. "You are making mountains out of mole hills. The
franchise is all right."

"It's not all right; and you're not all right," cried Norris, in a
frantic grasping after the truth of the matter. "The old relationships
are slipping away and something that was as dear to me as myself is
going with them."

He turned away and Dick suddenly rose.

"Ellery," he cried hoarsely, and Norris turned to see anguish in Dick's
face and outstretched hand, "I--I--can't explain to you," cried
Percival; "but, Ellery--" he moved forward, "don't cut the bonds of old
friendship, for God's sake! I need you now, as I never did before. If
you desert me, I shall lose my grip."

Norris stepped back, and the two took ea