up with the change in
public sentiment; public sentiment _has_ changed; changed so far that it
is coming to demand the punishment of the great offenders as well as the
jailing of the little ones. If we want to push this fight hard enough,
it is not impossible that you might find yourself in a hard row of
stumps at the end of it, David."

"I'm taking all those chances," was the even-toned rejoinder of the man
who was to be shown up.

"But there is one chance I'm sure you haven't considered," McVickar went
on aggressively. "This son of yours; I know as much about him as you
do--more, perhaps, for I have taken more pains to keep tab on him for
the past few years than you have. He is clean and straight, Blount; a
son for any father to be proud of. If that is the real reason why we
don't want to have him instructing the grand juries of this State, it is
also your best reason for wanting to keep the past decently under cover.
What will you say to him when the newspapers open up on you? And what
will he say to you? And suppose you get him in, and we should show you
up so that you'd be dragged into court with your own son for the
prosecutor? How does that strike you?"

For the first time since the opening of the one-sided conference the
senator laid his cigar aside and sat thoughtfully tugging at the
drooping mustaches.

"You'd set the house afire over my head, would you, Hardwick?" he
queried, with the gray eyes lighting up as with a glow of smouldering
embers. "The last time we talked you'll remember that you posted your
'de-fi'; now I'll post mine. You go ahead and do your damnedest! The boy
and I will try to see to it that you don't have all the fun. I won't
say that you mightn't turn him if you went at it right; but you won't go
at it right, and as matters stand now--well, blood is thicker than
water, Hardwick, and if you hit me you hit him. I reckon, between us,
we'll make out to give you as good as you send. That's all"--he rose to
lean heavily upon the table--"all but one thing: you fight fair,
Hardwick; say anything you like about me and I'll stand for it; but if
that boy has anything in his past that I don't know about--any little
fool trick that he wouldn't want to see published--you let it alone and
keep your damned newspaper hounds off of it!"

The vice-president, being of those who regain equanimity in exact
proportion as an opponent loses it, chuckled grimly; was still chuckling
when an interrupting tap cam