"_Mr. Stanhope_!" said Henry with an insufferable contemptuousness for which he at once apologized. "Harskin' your pardon, sir--I thought you inquired for my master. Mr. Stanhope, I 'ave 'eard, sir, has sailed for Europe." "Well, who's your master, then?" "Mr. Maginnis is my master, sir." Varney deliberated on this, and slowly smiled. "Well, you've got a good one, Henry." "Thank you, sir. That's 'im now, sir. I 'ear 'is motor in the road. If you'll excuse me, sir--I'll go and let 'im in." And he bowed and went away, only pausing in the entry to attend a moment to his blurred eyes with the back of a supple hand. Peter stepped out into the porch with a cheery greeting and dropped into a rocking-chair, looking worn and tired. The instant his heavy anxiety over Varney was relieved, he had thrown himself back into the fight for reform with a desperate vigor which entirely eclipsed all his previous efforts. "We-ell," he said in answer to Varney's question, "we're humping along--just humping along. Time's so confoundedly short, though. You know, Larry, this business the other night is proving the best card we've got. Fact. I haven't tried to tell you how worked up the people have been about your--accident, and how most of them don't stand for it for a minute. It's pretty well understood around town that politics was back of it all in some way, though nobody can state a single fact, and I've scoured the town for evidence without finding a scrap. Anyway, it's the solemn fact, and the committee can prove it, that that feeling is bringing over a lot of votes that we never could have reached otherwise with a long distance 'phone." "Praise be that they're coming over, anyhow." "This fight," continued Peter, absorbedly, "is confoundedly interesting because it is typical of what's going on all over the country. Hunston is just a dingy little microcosm of the whole United States of America. You can't blame these poor beggars here much, afraid of their jobs as they are. It takes courage to make a break for virtue when the devil's holding you by your bread and meat. But--well, I'd hate like the mischief to lose, particularly since we've managed to come in for such a beautiful lot of lime-light. You know this fight is being watched all over the country, since that trouble? And hang it, it does make a difference when the Associated Press carries half a column about you every night. Do you remember that first night in Hunston, Larry," he continued, "when you said that our part in the town's affairs must be that of quiet onlookers only? Quiet onlookers! And now everybody in the country is playing quiet onlookers on us. Our names are household words in California, and I'm credibly informed that they're naming babies after you all through the middle West. Funny, isn't it?" Varney assented with a laugh. Presently he said rather constrainedly: "Peter--I want you to tell me a little about that night. Who was caught?"