going to see that
he helps you--whatever he does."

Every bill that had a dollar in it was held at the bottom of the
calendar until satisfactory arrangements were made with Abner Handy and
his friends. When the legislative buccaneers under the black flag,
sailed after an insurance company, their bill remained at the bottom of
the calendar in one house or the other until Ab Handy had been seen, and
no one could find out why. And so, in spite of our dislike of the man,
our paper was forced to acknowledge that Handy was a house leader.
Although he had never had a dozen cases above the police court, he came
back at the end of the session with the local attorneyship of two
railroads, and was chairman of a house committee to investigate the
taxes paid by the railroads in the various counties. This gave him a
year's work, so he rented an office in the Worthington block and hired a
stenographer. Of course, we knew in town how Ab Handy had made his
money. But he paid so many of his old debts, and dispensed so many
favours with such a lordly hand, that it was hard to stir local
sentiment against him. He donned the clothes of a "prominent citizen,"
and in discussing public affairs assumed an owlish manner that impressed
his former associates, and fooled stupid people, who began to believe
that they had been harbouring a statesman unawares. But Charley Hedrick
only grinned when men talked to him of the rise of Handy, and replied to
the complaints of the scrupulous that Ab was no worse than he had always
been, and if he was making it pay better, no one was poorer for his
prosperity but Ab himself, and added: "Certainly he is a sincere
spender." One day when Handy appeared on the street in a particularly
fiery red necktie, Hedrick got him in a crowd, and began: "Just for a
handful of silver he left us--just for a riband to stick in his coat."
And when the crowd laughed with the joker, Hedrick continued in his
thick, gravy-coated voice: "Old Browning's the boy. You fellows that
want Shakespeare can have him; but Ab here knows that I take a little
dash of Browning in mine. Since Ab's got to be a statesman, he's bought
all of Webster's works and is learning 'em by heart. But"--and here
Hedrick chuckled and shook his fat sides before letting out the joke
which he enjoyed so much--"I says to Ab: as old Browning says, what does
'the fine felicity and flower of wickedness' like you need with
Webster; what you want to commit to memory is the