"And I've learned a lot about politics, too. I've come to see that it's just a great, greedy hand, reaching out to get the best of everything for itself. You don't see how it _could_ want to interfere with anything like giving people decenter houses to live in, and wiping the causes of disease out of the world, but it does, and it dips in just where you'd least expect it. That is why Mrs. Blythe is so anxiously watching the results of the city election, which is to be held next week. "Mr. Stoner, the owner of Diamond Row, is one of the candidates for office, and if he gets in he'll have it in his power to pull lots of wires against us in the Legislature. There is almost no hope of defeating him. Don't think that Mrs. Blythe has gone in personally for politics or anything like that, because she hasn't. But she has waked up a lot of influential people to work for her cause, and induced one of the foremost men in the senate to introduce the bill. Also she has managed to get an invitation to explain it all to a big audience that will be in the Opera House next week, before the election. "We are so excited over that, for it is one of the Big Opportunities that we hope will count for a great deal. She has a love of a new gown to wear, and a big black hat with plumes, and her speech is certainly soul-stirring. I wish you could hear her. It's nothing but 'the short and simple annals of the poor,' but when she gets done there won't be 'a dry eye in the house.' That's the highest praise that the Riverville _Herald_ can give, and it gives it to her so often that it has become a household joke at the Blythes." When Phil slipped this letter into his pocket he had changed his mind about buying a ticket to New York. He had decided to take a roundabout route by way of Riverville, with the privilege of a short stop-over. He intended that Mary should be one of the guests at the house-party, and he knew that the only way to persuade her was to go in person and answer each objection as it was raised. She had written jokingly of her disappointment, but her very effort to make light of it seemed pathetic to him, and showed him how deeply she felt it. All the way up from Mexico his thoughts kept drifting back to her. He wondered if he would find her greatly changed. She had passed through so much in the time he had been away, yet he was sure that he would find her the same sturdy, valiant little soul that had challenged his admiration when she was a child. He wondered what effect her mother's death had had upon her, and what had been the outcome of her association with a woman like Mrs. Blythe, one who made addresses in public. He hoped that Mary wouldn't imbibe any strong-minded, women's rights notions to detract from her feminine charm. He was glad she had mentioned so enthusiastically the "love of a gown, and the big, black plumed hat" that Mrs. Blythe was to wear.