tate
ticket as a candidate, knowing--as I could not help knowing--that I
would be expected to carry out the designs of the machine regardless of
right and wrong?"

"Certainly not," was the quick reply, "not if you were convinced that
the motive--your father's motive--was unworthy. But if you have been
telling me the truth, and all the truth, I should say that you didn't
stop to inquire what his motive was."

"What was the use of inquiring?" he demanded moodily. "He is the boss,
and he would have used the machine to put me into office as
attorney-general. In other words, I should have owed my election, not to
the will and selection of the people, but to the will of one man, and
that man my nearest kinsman; a man who is, beyond all question of doubt,
working hand in glove with all the trickery and double-dealing practised
by the corporations. Under such conditions, would it have been possible
for me to accept and to administer the office without fear or favor?"

"I don't know why not," she returned. "Notwithstanding your
charge--which merely shows how angry you are--your 'nearest kinsman,' as
you call him, would have been the last man in the world to interfere.
Wasn't that the very reason he gave you for wanting to put you on the
ticket?"

"I know," said Blount, whose mind was beginning to cloud again. "But
there are so many other mysteries. We'll say that my father honestly
wanted me to stand for the candidacy. But right in the midst of things
he conspires with Mr. McVickar to put me into my present unspeakable
dilemma."

Her smile was gently reproachful.

"It is my poor opinion, Evan, that you don't half appreciate your
father. Worse than that, you don't know him. But that is beside the
present mark. What are you going to do?"

"I have already done it. I have wired my resignation to Mr. McVickar,
and he will doubtless accept it."

She was looking him fairly in the eyes. "That is the second unwise thing
you have done," she remarked. And then: "Evan, there are times when you
are sadly in need of a balance-wheel. Don't you know that?"

"I knew it a good while ago. I applied for one once, and it was refused
when you said 'No'."

For one who was supposed to be far above and beyond such emotional
signallings, she blushed very prettily. Which merely proves that one may
be a diplomaed sociologist with a burning zeal for alleviating the
miseries of a sodden world, without having parted with the primitive sex
impuls