in discovering the fact. A week later Captain Will Hallam said to
him:

"So you've been quarreling with Napper Tandy?"

"Yes," answered Duncan. "He offered to bribe me to make a false report
in the railroad extension matter."

"Why didn't you tell me about it?"

"Oh, I didn't want to bother you with a whining. I rejected the bribe,
of course, and told him what I thought of him, and that seemed to me
enough."

"Well, it wasn't. You ought to have told me. Then we could have made him
put his offer into writing, or make it in my presence. As it is, he's
got you where the hair is uncommonly short."

"How do you mean?"

"Why, he has written to the financiers, telling them that as soon as
they employed you, you went to him and demanded a payment of ten
thousand dollars as an inducement to you to make a favorable report;
that he refused, and that consequently your report was adverse. They
will refuse to build the railroad, but they have written to ask me as to
your integrity."

"The infernal scoundrel! How----"

"It doesn't pay to call him names. We must think out a way to meet this
thing."

"I'll horsewhip him on the street!" exclaimed Duncan.

"No, don't! That would only advertise the matter and do no good. A man
of your physique has no occasion for fear in horsewhipping a man like
Napper Tandy, and can show no courage by doing it. The only result would
be that people would say there must be something in his accusation, else
you wouldn't be so mad about it. You have made a good many enemies, you
know, and they will take pleasure in repeating Tandy's accusations.
Really, Duncan, you ought to have been more discreet. You ought to have
taken a witness with you, when you went to his house for consultation.
As it is, the financiers have so far believed in you as to reject his
scheme on your report, and in face of his accusation, but he'll do you a
mighty lot of damage in Cairo and elsewhere. I don't know what to do."

"I do," answered Guilford Duncan resolutely. "A year ago you and Ober
wanted to make me mayor of this town. I explained to you that I was
ineligible then, not having been long enough a resident of the State. I
am eligible now, and I shall announce myself to-day as a candidate."

"What good will that do?"

"It will give the people of the city a chance to pass upon my
integrity--to say by their ballots what they think of me; and,
incidentally, it may give me an opportunity to say what I think and kno