they put into
office are all beholden to the railroad, and are of a sort which good
citizens cannot support. They say that the railroad has destroyed the
people's government."

Mr. Flint, for the moment forgetting or ignoring the charges, glanced
at her in astonishment. The arraignment betrayed an amount of thought on
the subject which he had not suspected.

"Upon my word, Victoria," he said, "you ought to take the stump for
Humphrey Crewe."

She reached out with a womanly gesture, and laid her hand upon his.

"I am only telling you--what I hear," she said.

"Won't you explain to me the way you look at it? These people don't
all seem to be dishonest men or charlatans. Some of them, I know, are
honest." And her colour rose again.

"Then they are dupes and fools," Mr. Flint declared vehemently. "I don't
know how to explain it to you the subject is too vast, too far-reaching.
One must have had some business experience to grasp it. I don't mean to
say you're not intelligent, but I'm at a loss where to begin with you.
Looked at from their limited point of view, it would seem as if they had
a case. I don't mean your friend, Humphrey Crewe--it's anything to get
office with him. Why, he came up here and begged me--"

"I wasn't thinking of Humphrey Crewe," said Victoria. Mr. Flint gave an
ejaculation of distaste.

"He's no more of a reformer than I am. And now we've got that wild
son of Hilary Vane's--the son of one of my oldest friends and
associates--making trouble. He's bitten with this thing, too, and
he's got some brains in his head. Why," exclaimed Mr. Flint, stopping
abruptly and facing his daughter, "you know him! He's the one who drove
you home that evening from Crewe's party."

"I remember," Victoria faltered, drawing her hand away.

"I wasn't very civil to him that night, but I've always been on the
lookout for him. I sent him a pass once, and he came up here and gave me
as insolent a talking to as I ever had in my life."

How well Victoria recalled that first visit, and how she had wondered
about the cause of it! So her father and Austen Vane had quarrelled from
the first.

"I'm sure he didn't mean to be insolent," she said, in a low voice. "He
isn't at all that sort."

"I don't know what sort he is, except that he isn't my sort," Mr. Flint
retorted, intent upon the subject which had kindled his anger earlier in
the day. "I don't pretend to understand him. He could probably have been
counsel for the