was an established method
of revenue and he seemed to be obsessed with the belief that no Minister
of the Crown would allow his oath of office to interfere with the
acquisition of personal wealth. As their relations had ripened he had
grown bolder and had organized a construction company with the object of
using his "connection" to swing certain tenders for public works into the
graft column. Nickleby had felt so sure of himself by this time that he
even had proposed a contribution of $50,000 to the party campaign funds
in return for "privileges." He had been told quite plainly that he would
make such a contribution at his own risk. Nevertheless he had gone ahead
with it on his own initiative. The money had mysteriously disappeared
between the office of the construction company and its destination; it
had never reached the party exchequer.

Which brought the Honorable Milton Waring to the point of paying high
compliment to the editor of the _Recorder_. He bowed to McAllister. He
had never before quite realized, he said, what a debt all lovers of clean
government owed to the press. No man with designs upon the public
treasury could go very far without some journalistic watch-dog being on
his trail, and it was so in the present instance.

The Alderson Construction Company had aroused the suspicions of Mr.
McAllister shortly after it became active. In some way he had learned of
the proposed campaign fund contribution and, as it turned out, it was due
to the zeal of a _Recorder_ reporter that Nickleby's contribution had
been intercepted and photographed. It had then fallen into the hands of
Mr. Benjamin Wade by accident and Mr. Wade had deposited the $50,000 in
trust, pending proof of ownership.

A few days ago Mr. Wade had come to him with these facts and also to warn
him that the _Recorder_ was preparing to accuse him of being implicated
with Nickleby and Blatchford Ferguson in a certain doubtful real-estate
transaction. Not until then had he realized the risk which Mr. Ferguson
and he had assumed in attempting to follow their own line of
investigation in secret. The possibility that the hunter might in turn
be hunted--and quite legitimately hunted on the face of it--had not
occurred to them. They had taken Mr. McAllister into their confidence as
soon as they realized the extent of his knowledge, and only his patience
and co-operation had enabled them to carry their investigations to
fruition.

The real-