tell."

The upshot of this was that the task of obtaining an account of Mr.
Sluss's habits, tastes, and proclivities was assigned to that now
rather dignified legal personage, Mr. Burton Stimson, who in turn
assigned it to an assistant, a Mr. Marchbanks. It was an amazing
situation in some respects, but those who know anything concerning the
intricacies of politics, finance, and corporate control, as they were
practised in those palmy days, would never marvel at the wells of
subtlety, sinks of misery, and morasses of disaster which they
represented.

From another quarter, the Hon. Patrick Gilgan was not slow in
responding to Cowperwood's message. Whatever his political connections
and proclivities, he did not care to neglect so powerful a man.

"And what can I be doing for you to-day, Mr. Cowperwood?" he inquired,
when he arrived looking nice and fresh, very spick and span after his
victory.

"Listen, Mr. Gilgan," said Cowperwood, simply, eying the Republican
county chairman very fixedly and twiddling his thumbs with fingers
interlocked, "are you going to let the city council jam through the
General Electric and that South Side 'L' road ordinance without giving
me a chance to say a word or do anything about it?"

Mr. Gilgan, so Cowperwood knew, was only one of a new quadrumvirate
setting out to rule the city, but he pretended to believe that he was
the last word--an all power and authority--after the fashion of
McKenty. "Me good man," replied Gilgan, archly, "you flatter me. I
haven't the city council in me vest pocket. I've been county chairman,
it's true, and helped to elect some of these men, but I don't own 'em.
Why shouldn't they pass the General Electric ordinance? It's an honest
ordinance, as far as I know. All the newspapers have been for it. As
for this 'L' road ordinance, I haven't anything to do with it. It
isn't anything I know much about. Young MacDonald and Mr. Schryhart
are looking after that."

As a matter of fact, all that Mr. Gilgan was saying was decidedly true.
A henchman of young MacDonald's who was beginning to learn to play
politics--an alderman by the name of Klemm--had been scheduled as a
kind of field-marshal, and it was MacDonald--not Gilgan, Tiernan,
Kerrigan, or Edstrom--who was to round up the recalcitrant aldermen,
telling them their duty. Gilgan's quadrumvirate had not as yet got
their machine in good working order, though they were doing their best
to bring this about.