Garwood sat on the tumbled bed in his inner room, pale and haggard. A cigar fumed constantly in his teeth. A tray of whisky glasses lay on the table. With Garwood were Rankin and Bailey. They had gone over the situation again and again. Delegate after delegate had been led in to interview the congressman, every argument, every persuasion, every threat that the three men could devise had been used. But they made no appreciable headway. They had seventy votes and they felt that they could hold them, for Rankin vouched for the twenty-two men from Polk, the Singed Cat was calmly certain of his eighteen votes from Mason, and Hale scouted the idea of any one of the thirty Tazewell fellows failing. The remaining voles were so evenly divided between Garwood's opponents that each would hesitate to go to the other. Any coalition with the Sprague men was impossible; they were as determined as Garwood's own. They must look for strength to the Barrett following. They considered Pusey, and the twenty-three votes he controlled. "Can't you see him, Jim?" Garwood suggested to Rankin. The big man spat and shook his head. "It 'uld do no good fer me to see him. I'd hate to speak to the little cur, anyway." "Well, look here, Jim, you mustn't let any personal feeling stand in the way of our success," Garwood snarled. He was growing peevish from the heat, the strain, the anxiety. Rankin laughed, as if at the whim of a child. "Don't worry 'bout me, Jerry," he said. He had dropped back into his own old way of calling Garwood by his familiar name since the contest for renomination had brought the congressman down to the hard earth again. "I'll play my end of the game. Let Zeph here see him." They considered in turn the twenty-four men from Logan County. O'Malley was sent for, and came, half fearfully, reporting that his hands were tied by the exigencies of affairs in his own county. He was half afraid to be seen at Garwood's headquarters, lest suspicion stab him, though a combination by which Garwood, when he knew his own chances were gone, would throw his strength to Barrett was the one practical thing to do.