“Conover, eh?” he rapped out. “Heard of you, sir! Heard of you!-- Too often, in fact. You’re the fellow that’s always buying up our legislators, aren’t you? Why do you do it, sir?” “Because they’re for sale,” said Caleb, unruffled. “I guess that’s ’bout the only reason I’m able to.” “You mean to accuse the men who represent our interests at the Capital,--to accuse them of being willing, untempted, to sell their vote?” “Oh, I wouldn’t go so far as that,” answered Caleb with a tolerant grin. “They ain’t _all_ waitin’ for chances to sell their vote. Some of ’em prefers to rent it out by the year.” “Do you want me to believe such a libel on our statesmen?” declaimed Greer. “On the men we--” “I’m not exactly coaxin’ you to believe _anything_,” replied Caleb, pleasantly, “An’ I ain’t liable to lay wake nights moanin’ because you doubt it. If the people didn’t want to be run by a lobby, they wouldn’t be. That’s all there is to it.” “I didn’t come to discuss ethics with a man of your stamp,” sneered the General. “But I can tell you you are wrong--_wrong_, sir--in thinking the people will always stand such conditions as you and your kind are thrusting upon them. Only yesterday one of my clients was telling me that if he could not curb your legislative influence by fair means he would--” “Come to you for help?” finished Caleb blandly. General Greer stared at him speechless, apoplectic. Letty, who, despite years of sharp contrary experience, still clung to the fond delusion that she was the spoiled-child-niece of fiction who could twist an otherwise crotchety uncle about her finger, now intervened with one of her inspired blunders. The General’s rumbling voice had drawn attention to their table and Miss Standish conceived a plan of pouring oil on the thundrous waters. “Why, Uncle Guy!” she pouted prettily, “You’ll make Mr. Conover think you’re in earnest in the dreadful things you are saying to him! It’s just dear Uncle Guy’s bluff way, Mr. Conover, that he picked up when he was commanding soldiers in the army. He’s really a darling old lamb, if only--” After one long, dumb glare of annihilation at his self-appointed spoiled-child-niece, the darling old lamb stumped away, bleating blasphemously. “I wonder,” conjectured Desirée, looking up from her tall glass, “why seltzer lemonades make such squizzy sounds through the straw when the glass is almost empty.” “If that’s a hint,--” observed Caine, glancing about for a waiter. “No,” she replied. “Only a scientific comment. Oh, it _is_ good to be in the country a day like this.” “I’ll be in the country for the summer, this time next month,” said Jack Hawarden, “Mother’s taken the same cottage at the Antlers we had last year. It will be nice to get back to the old Adirondacks again.” “The Adirondacks?” exclaimed Desirée. “Oh, take me along. I’ve always wanted to go there!”