ry,
and the primaries are not till June."

"Squire Hexter, it ain't too early to show a man in this town where he
gets off. That man is Tasper Britt. He has had ten dollars' worth of
telling to-day by 'Sniffer' Orne. But telling ain't showing. What do you
say?"

The Squire gave Jones a whimsical wink and indicated the attentive
Vaniman with a jab of the thumb. "S-s-sh! Look out, or the rate of
interest will go up."

Jones and his associates scowled at the cashier, and Vaniman understood
with added bitterness the extent of his vicarious atonement as Britt's
mouthpiece at the wicket of the bank.

"The interest-payers of this town have been well dreened. But the
voters--the _voters_, understand, still have assets. The voters have got
to the point where they ain't afraid of Tasper Britt. The cashier of
his bank can so report to him, if the said cashier so chooses--and, as
cashier, probably will."

"The cashier will attend strictly and exclusively to his bank duties,
and to nothing else," declared Vaniman, with heat.

"Hope you're enjoying 'em, such as they are of late," Jones retorted.
"But once again, what say, Squire Hexter?"

"Boys, you'd better get somebody else to sandpaper Tasper Britt with.
I'm not gritty enough."

"I'll come across with our full idea, Squire. It ain't simply to
sandpaper Britt with that we want you to go. But we need some kind of
legislation to help this town out of the hole. We don't know where we
are. We can't raise money to pay state taxes, and we ain't getting our
school money from the state, nor any share of the roads appropriation,
nor--"

"I know, Ike," broke in the Squire, not requiring any legal posting from
a layman. "But it's the lobbyist, instead of the legislator, who really
counts at the state capital. I've been planning to do a little lobbying
at the next session. I'll tell you now that I'll go, and, by hooking a
clean collar around each ankle under my socks, I'll be prepared for a
two weeks' stay. Send somebody else to work for the state and I'll go
and work for Egypt."

"The voters want you," Jones insisted.

The Squire rapped his toe against the old dog at his feet. "What say,
Eli?"

"Wuff!" the dog replied, emphatically.

"Can't go as a legislator, boys! Eli says 'No.'"

"This ain't no time for joking," growled the spokesman.

"Certainly not!" The Squire snapped back his retort briskly. He was
serious. "I agree with you that this poor old town needs help and a