The Honorable Senator Sage-Brush

club to a private dining-room in the Inter-Mountain Hotel, whose entrance portico faces the Capitol grounds in the chief city of the Sage-brush State, whose eastern windo

synchronized very fairly with the threshing out of college reminiscences by the two young men whose apparently fortuitous meeting o

s ice, and was sitting back to clip the end from a very long and very black cigar. He was a man past middle-age, large-framed and heavy, with the square, resolute face of a born master of circumstances. Like the younger generation, he was clean shaven; hence there was no mask for the deeply graven lines of determination about the mouth and along the angle of the

, graying mustaches. Like McVickar, he had the lion-like face of mastership, but the fine wrinkles at the corners of the wide-set eyes postulated a sense of humor which was lacking in his table companion. His mouth, half hidden b

lipped the end from his cigar. "You know as well as I do that under the present law in this State we are practically bank

hing that sounded a good deal like that

oad company, but to the people it serves. We can't give adequate service when the cost ex

State Railroad Commission of the simpleness?" asked t

pe to convince a rabidly anti-railroad

gested the other. "We don't hear anything abou

ur State boundaries. If it did, we might as well surrender our charter

McVickar," said the listener quietly. "I'm sure you didn't make me mo

are deal," was

ce lasted a blamed long time. You are equitably, if not legally, in debt to every man in this State who had ever shipped a car-load of freight or paid a passen

up and braced his arms

been dickering together you've always been a hard-bitted and consistent fighter for your own hand. What's happened to you lately?

good-nature. "We are all growing older-and wiser, p

y, and with a definite emphasis upon the personal pronoun. "

his chair with his hands in his pockets, and the smile wrinkl

"A third fellow standing around and hearing you t

accepted rule the world over, and we both recognize it. You are figuring on something; I know you are. Nam

man who was not smoking, after a long minute. "Let's ride back to the beginning and ge

isn't going to be-not if we can help it," declared

y slow and obstinate, Hardwick. You don't know anything but wire-pulling and crookedness and bribery. The times have changed, and yo

in the prize-ring when the two antagonists have drawn apart and are wari

e sure of accomplishing anything worth while with Gordon in the governor's office; you kn

honest man and a fair one. If you could stay out of the fight and go to him with

to pass our case up to a man who has been elected by an unfriendly opposition. If we should wash our hands of the fight, as you suggest, we mig

ilroad string-pullers-that you have lost the straightforward combination completely. If yo

one fighting hardily for the side upon which he had happened to be drawn in the great world battle. If he had not long ago parted with his convictio

he same reason. Let's get together. You control the political situation in your State, and we frankly recognize that fact. It's a matter of business, and we

e got to take the same ground and make a clean fight if you w

n this particular occasion to read me a kindergarten lecture on political methods. In times past I

dawned in American politics; I and my kind recognize it, and you and your kind don't seem to be big enough to recognize it. That is the difference between us. In the present instance it comes down to this: you are going to fight for a railroad majority in the legis

nothing without your say-so as the head of the party organization. That is precisely why

his Southern boyhood. And then half-quizzically: "Are you tolerably well satisfied that you've got around to the place where you are willing to tote fair with me

g a capitulative admission. When he spoke, the militant second

. I suppose you can crack the whip and swing the vote on the legislature, and you can

t, are you?" said the veteran mildl

s if we concede your bare majority in the legislature and put up the right kind of a fight. And when it comes to Rankin, our candidate for attorney-general, you

u had learned your lesson-you and your tribe. I came to town this evening prepared to show you a decent way out of your troubles, so far as this St

ator?" he asked, fixing his gaze upon the shrewd old eyes of the other, which, for the first t

ikely call it an old man's foolishness. I ha

and the big man opposite

wick, and I'd like mighty well to have the boy with me. Out of that notion grew another. I said to myself this: Now, here's McVickar; if he could have a good, clean-cut young man in this State representing his railroad-a man who not only knew his way around in a court-room, but who might also know how to plead his

lf over the strong face of the

ty miles around when there is a short way across. Why didn't you te

ober protest. "You forget that you've just been telling me that you don't intend to comply with

cond

meet the people of this State half-way on

know that as well, or better, than I do. But let that go. We'll

of round-ups straightened himself in his

ou what I'm going to do. I telegraphed the boy this afternoon, telling him to throw up his job in Boston and come out here. If he comes within a reasonable time he will be

e the deft waiter was clearing the table and serving the small coffees he kep

e of the neck, as usual,

with the new public opinion an

ts details. As a contingency to be met sooner or later, the vice-president had anticipated the thing which had now come to pass. That Blount should wish to push the fortunes of his son was perfectly natural; and it was no less natural that he should push them by making the railroad company's pay-roll furnish the motive-power. The magnate smiled inwardly when he remembered that he had given Gantry, the division traff

down our arms and put a possible enemy in the saddle on the eve of a battle. If we should agree to meet the peop

ppearing again at the corners

boss. "You'd like to behave yourself and be good, of course; but you

little time in which to consider it,

now and the election. Go on and do your cons

hat you propose. With an unfriendly attorney-genera

t pointedly up to you

coat-sleeve with the table-napkin. When he looked up, th

nd I'll try to make it possible to mee

way to the eastward, was declaring his weariness and his intention of going to b