s are here already," he said, and he had them shown
into the large room, where the tables for their use had been placed.

It was brilliantly illuminated, and a dozen men were sitting about
speculating on the events of the day and hoping for a happy result.
Among them was old Senator Curtis, who had come all the way from
Wyoming, and he was loudly declaring that if Mr. Grayson were not
elected he would never take any interest in another Presidential
election. The others made no comment on his declaration.

Harley came in late. At dinner with the Graysons he had been thinking,
when he looked at Sylvia's lovely face across the table, that it would
always be just across the table from him now, and the thought was such a
happy one that it clung to him.

The correspondents disposed themselves about the room, and placed pencil
and paper on the tables; yet there would be nothing for them to write
for a long time. They were only to tell the story of how the candidate
took it, after the story itself was told. Their business was with either
a paean or a dirge.

Harley looked around at the group, all of whom he knew.

"Have you fellows thought that this is our last meeting?" he asked.

There was a sudden silence in the room. All seemed to feel the solemnity
of the moment. Out in the street some happy men, who had helped to empty
the bowl, were singing a campaign song, and its sound came faintly to
the group.

"A wager to you boys that none of you can name the state from which the
first completed return will come. What odds will you give?" said "King"
Plummer, who was resolutely seeking to be cheerful.

"We won't take your wager because we'd win, sure," said Hobart. "It will
be a precinct in New York City, up-town. They get through quick there;
they never fail to be first."

"Whatever the vote there is, I am going to look upon it as an omen,"
said Mr. Heathcote. "If our majority is reduced it will mean a bad
start, good ending; if our majority is increased, it will mean that a
good beginning is half the battle."

Dexter, the chairman of the state campaign committee, entered, his thin
face still shadowed by gloomy thoughts.

"We've had a few bulletins at headquarters, but nothing definite," he
said. "All the reports so far are from the East, of course, owing to the
difference in time, but I'd like mighty well to know what they are doing
out there on the Slope and in the Rockies."

"We'll know in good time, Charlie; just