"Now that I'm down here I'll say this. I'll do everything I can, as mayor of Marion, to straighten things out to-night so that the people won't be left guessing. Guessing starts gabble and gabble starts trouble! Don't do any more shouting about 'state steal,' and don't allow others to shout. Most of us don't know what it means, anyway, and others don't care, so long as it gives 'em a chance to stir up riots and grab off something for themselves under cover of the trouble. There are a lot of outsiders in this country, standing ready to make just such plays! Don't let your ears be scruffed by mischief-makers, boys. Let's have our city come through with a clean name! I'm going to do my part as best I can. But you've all got to do yours--understand that!" He smacked his fist down into his palm. "Do you bromise me dot Karl Trimbach gets dot seat?" boomed Mr. Weisner. "The same question goes as to th' Hon'rable Danyel O'Donnell," said Adherent Mulcahy. "I cannot promise." Then sounded that voice of the unknown troublemaker, sneeringly shrill, the senseless, passion-provoking common, human fife of the mob spirit, persistently present and consistently cowardly in concealment. "Of course you don't promise anything to the people! Dudes stand together! Go back and dance!" Lanigan began to claw a passage for himself. "Stand where you are, Joe!" commanded Stewart. "Don't flatter a fool by making any account of him!" "Those kinds of fools are going to make trouble in this city before the night is over, Your Honor!" "That's the trouble with politics," declared Mulcahy. "Ye can't get a square promise in politics fr'm th' Big Boys!" Morrison put up a monitory forefinger. "But you can get a square promise from me in business--and I can see that it's time to give that promise and make it specific. That's the way a business contract must be drawn. Hear me, then! It's the business of this city to see that no man abuses its good name or its hospitality, no matter whether he's a resident or comes here because it's the capital of the state. And I'll see to it that the men up at the State House end understand that they must play fair for the good of all of us. You must understand the same at this end. I'll take no sides in politics. The men who are entitled to their seats in this legislature will have those seats. I'm only one man, boys! But one man who is perfectly honest and is depending on the right will find the whole law of the land behind him--and wise men and good men have attended to the law. Will you take my word and let it stand that way between us?" A chorused yell of assent greeted him. "All right! It's a contract! Mind your end of it!" He turned sharply from them and faced Krylovensky. The alien leaped up and kicked the mayor's garments to one side. "Say! See here, my friend!" expostulated Stewart. "Down with rulers!" screamed the man. "I'll be a martyr, but not a hat-rack!"