ow a man that his lies do not fool
you. "I am glad to hear you say these things, Dominick," said I. "I am
glad you are loyal to the party."

"You can trust me, Senator," said he earnestly.

"I can trust your common sense," said I. And I proceeded to grasp this
lucky chance to get away. "I am leaving," I went on, "as soon as the
coffee is served. I shall look to you to send these gentlemen home in a
proper frame of mind toward the party."

His eyes glistened. Except his growing fortune, nothing delighted him so
much as a chance to "rough-house" his eminently respectable "pals." He
felt toward them that quaint mixture of envy, contempt and a desire to
fight which fills a gamin at sight of a fashionably dressed boy. He put
out his big hand and dampened mine with it. "You can count on me,
Senator," he said gratefully. "I'll trim 'em, comb and tail-feathers."

"Don't overlook their spurs," said I.

"They ain't got none," said he, "except those you lend 'em."

We returned to a table palled by sullen dread--dread of me, anger
against Dominick who, in the courage of his ignorance of the
conventionalities which restrained them, had taken the short, straight
cut to me and peace. And, as veterans in the no-quarter warfare of
ambition, they knew I had granted him peace on no less terms than their
heads.

They had all, even Roebuck, been drinking freely in the effort to
counteract the depression. But the champagne seemed only to aggravate
their gloom except in the case of young Jamieson. He had just succeeded,
through the death of his father, to the privilege of levying upon the
people of eleven counties by means of trolley franchises which the
legislature had granted his father in perpetuity in return for financial
services to "the party." It is, by the way, an interesting illustration
of the human being's lack of thinking power that a legislature could not
give away a small gold-mine belonging to the public to any man for even
a brief term of years without causing a revolution, but could and does
give away far more valuable privileges to plunder and to tax, and give
them away for ever, without causing any real stir. However--young
Jamieson's liquor, acting upon a mind that had not had enough experience
to appreciate the meaning of the situation, drove him on to insolent
taunts and boasts, addressed to his neighbors but intended for me. I
ignored him and, when the coffee was served, rose to depart.

Roebuck urged me to sta