thing for Cowperwood. It's
passing these ordinances in favor of other people that's stirring up
the trouble."

Mr. Hand's broad forehead wrinkled, and his blue eyes surveyed Mr.
Gilgan with suspicion. "Who are these men, anyhow?" he inquired. "I'd
like to get a list of them."

Mr. Gilgan, safe in his own subtlety, was ready with a toll of the
supposed recalcitrants. They must fight their own battles. Mr. Hand
wrote down the names, determining meanwhile to bring pressure to bear.
He decided also to watch Mr. Gilgan. If there should prove to be a
hitch in the programme the newspapers should be informed and commanded
to thunder appropriately. Such aldermen as proved unfaithful to the
great trust imposed on them should be smoked out, followed back to the
wards which had elected them, and exposed to the people who were behind
them. Their names should be pilloried in the public press. The
customary hints as to Cowperwood's deviltry and trickery should be
redoubled.

But in the mean time Messrs. Stimson, Avery, McKibben, Van Sickle, and
others were on Cowperwood's behalf acting separately upon various
unattached aldermen--those not temperamentally and chronically allied
with the reform idea--and making them understand that if they could
find it possible to refrain from supporting anti-Cowperwood measures
for the next two years, a bonus in the shape of an annual salary of two
thousand dollars or a gift in some other form--perhaps a troublesome
note indorsed or a mortgage taken care of--would be forthcoming,
together with a guarantee that the general public should never know.
In no case was such an offer made direct. Friends or neighbors, or
suave unidentified strangers, brought mysterious messages. By this
method some eleven aldermen--quite apart from the ten regular Democrats
who, because of McKenty and his influence, could be counted upon--had
been already suborned. Although Schryhart, Hand, and Arneel did not
know it, their plans--even as they planned--were being thus undermined,
and, try as they would, the coveted ordinance for a blanket franchise
persistently eluded them. They had to content themselves for the time
being with a franchise for a single 'L' road line on the South Side in
Schryhart's own territory, and with a franchise to the General Electric
covering only one unimportant line, which it would be easy for
Cowperwood, if he continued in power, to take over at some later time.

Chapter XL