?"

"Passably well. I came across him one summer in the mountains of Peru,
where he was managing a railroad. He is a mighty good sort. I had mountain
fever, and he took me in and did for me."

"He is with us now," said David Kent; "the newly appointed general manager
of the Western Pacific."

"Good!" said the club-man "I think a lot of him; he is an all-around
dependable fellow, and plenty capable. I'm glad to know he has caught on
higher up."

The locomotive whistle was droning again, and a dodging procession of
red-eyed switch-lights flicked past the windows. Kent stood up and flung
away the stump of his cigar.

"The capital," he announced. "I'll go back with you and help out with the
shawl-strap things." And in the vestibule he added: "I spoke of Loring
because he will be with us in anything we have to do in Mrs. Brentwood's
behalf. Look him up when you have time--fourth floor of the Quintard."

VI

OF THE MAKING OF LAWS

The session, the shortest in the history of the State, and thus far the
least eventful, was nearing its close; and the alarmists who had
prophesied evil and evil only of the "Populist" victory were fast losing
credit with the men of their own camp and with the country at large.

After the orthodox strife over the speakership of the House, and the
equally orthodox wrangle over contested seats, the State Assembly had
settled down to routine business, despatching it with such unheard-of
celerity as to win columns of approval from the State press as a whole;
though there were not wanting a few radical editors to raise the
ante-election cry of reform, and to ask pointedly when it was to begin.

Notwithstanding the lack of alarms, however, the six weeks had been a
period of unceasing vigilance on the part of the interests which were
supposed to be in jeopardy. Every alien corporation owning property and
doing business in the State had its quota of watchful defenders on the
ground; men who came and went, in the lobbies of the capitol, in the
visitors' galleries, at the receptions; men who said little, but who saw
and heard all things down to the small talk of the corridors and the
clubs, and the gossip of the hotel rotundas.

David Kent was of this silent army of observation, doing watch-dog duty
for the Western Pacific; thankful enough, if the truth be told, to have a
thing to do which kept him from dwelling overmuch upon the wreck of his
hopes. But in the closing days of the session,