"Get busy," declared Jap. "We have given out enough plate. The _Herald_ is going back on the job." Bill felt a lump rise in his throat as he paused to finger the copy on his hook. "We have to get the drums beating," said Jap. "We have to elect Wat Harlow governor, and, believe the Barton _Standard_, we have some rough road to travel." And the battle was on! Alone, the Bloomtown _Herald_ tackled the job of making a governor. Watson Harlow had been a familiar figure in state politics for more than twenty years, but as gubernatorial timber no one had ever regarded him seriously. His opponent, on the other hand, was a fresh figure in the state, with all the novelty of the unknown quantity about him. It was an off year for the dominant party, both locally and nationally, and the fight promised to be a complicated one. Week by week the battle raged between the types. Little by little the country press began to get in the fight. Not content with the picturesque drumming of his own machine, Jap interested the city press in the history of Wat Harlow, the "Lone Pine, of Integrity Absolute." This descriptive title was proclaimed in and out of season during the months of battle, both before and after the nomination of Harlow and Jones. Jap invented a stinger for Bronson Jones. In his past history, it was alleged, he had much that were better concealed than revealed. Not the least of his offenses was that he had assisted his father, a certain P. D. Jones, in stealing red-hot cook-stoves from the ruins of the Chicago fire. Jap so declared, and he offered to prove that Jones had sold these same stoves to their former owners, when they became cold. In one instance, the victim was a widow who had lost everything, even her former mate, in the fire. And Jones carried the title, "The Widow's Friend," for years. All this was fun for the city dailies, and cartoons of the "Lone Pine" being fed to the "Cook-Stove" alternated with those of the pine falling upon the "Widow's Friend" as he was about to sell a stove to the above-mentioned widow. The color came back to Jap's cheeks, and the battle light flamed in his gray eyes. His one relaxation was the tranquil hour with Isabel. Harlow, like an uneasy ghost, haunted the _Herald_ office when he was not out storming the hustings. The Barton _Standard_ continued to pry into Wat's past, while the _Herald_ continued to lift the lid from the chest of Bronson's secret garments. Unfortunately, the _Standard_ had played its big trump card in the congressional campaign. The vermilion handbill was once more dragged to light, but it worked like a boomerang, for several of Wat's own party workers had been caught red-handed in the act of attempting to operate a shameless graft game, in the name of the university. And Jap utilized the story to show that Wat was a man above party, a man in whose mind integrity was indeed absolute.