rtly at her.

Perhaps she had not heard; she was gazing into the distance with a
strange expression upon her beautiful face, an expression that fastened
his attention, absorbed though he was in his project for his own
ambitions. As her father disappeared, he said:

"What are you thinking about, Jane?"

Jane startled guiltily. "I? Oh--I don't know--a lot of things."

"Your look suggested that you were having a--a severe attack of
conscience," said he, laughingly. He was in soaring good humor now,
for he saw his way clear to election.

"I was," said Jane, suddenly stern. A pause, then she laughed--rather
hollowly. "Davy, I guess I'm almost as big a fraud as you are. What
fakirs we human beings are?--always posing as doing for others and
always doing for our selfish selves."

Davy's face took on its finest expression. "Do you think it's
altogether selfishness for me to fight for Victor Dorn and give him a
chance to get out his paper again--when he has warned me that he is
going to print things that may defeat me?"

"You know he'll not print them now," retorted Jane.

"Indeed I don't. He's not so forbearing."

"You know he'll not print them now," repeated Jane. "He'd not be so
foolish. Every one would forget to ask whether what he said about you
was true or false. They'd think only of how ungenerous and ungrateful
he was. He wouldn't be either. But he'd seem to be--and that comes to
the same thing." She glanced mockingly at Hull. "Isn't that your
calculation?"

"You are too cynical for a woman, Jane," said Davy. "It's not
attractive."

"To your vanity?" retorted Jane. "I should think not."

"Well--good-by," said Davy, taking his hat from the rail. "I've got a
hard evening's work before me. No time for dinner."

"Another terrible sacrifice for public duty," mocked Jane.

"You must be frightfully out of humor with yourself, to be girding at
me so savagely," said Davy.

"Good-by, Mr. Mayor."

"I shall be--in six weeks."

Jane's face grew sombre. "Yes--I suppose so," said she. "The people
would rather have one of us than one of their own kind. They do look up
to us, don't they? It's ridiculous of them, but they do. The idea of
choosing you, when they might have Victor Dorn."

"He isn't running for Mayor," objected Hull. "The League's candidate
is Harbinger, the builder."

"No, it's Victor Dorn," said Jane. "The best man in a party--the
strongest man--is always the candidate for