When a black boy grinned in the doorway, Jennings sent for Hennessey, and soon, the old elevator having clambered to the parlor floor, there was a knock. Jennings yelled “Come!” and in the doorway stood a young Irishman, red-cheeked and with closely-cropped, silver-sprinkled black hair. In the cities, the hair of the Irish-American--especially in politics, and they are all in--turns gray early. Hennessey was strong in the Thirteenth Ward of Chicago, hence his job in the office of the secretary of state. Jennings had been writing while awaiting the Irishman’s coming. Turning to him the secretary of state gave his instructions, and he departed. As he closed the door Grigsby called: “I’ll make it all right with you, Mike.” Grigsby went to the window and pressed his face to one of the small panes, placing his hands as blinds beside his eyes as a little child does. The cold glass soothed his forehead deliciously. He saw Shorty, who has driven “statesmen” on their mysterious nightly rounds for generations, mount the box of his old hack and pull his reluctant horses into the street. Then he turned to confront the three hours’ wait. He poked the smouldering fire of soft prairie coal, gave Jennings a cigar, and was about to pull the old-fashioned brass bell crank that more cheer might be added to the factitious comfort he sought to create in the room, when Jennings, meditatively scratching his head, said: “Bill, where’s them notes o’ yourn?” “Why, in the treasury, I suppose.” “Well, you’ll have to get some one who can open the vaults fer you to-night.” Grigsby’s brow darkened, and the small cheerfulness that had begun to adumbrate itself in his face faded quite away. “That’s so--I hadn’t thought of that.” He pondered heavily and then said, the old note of fear in his tone: “Has that vault a time lock?” “I reckon.” They were silent. “Well,” said Grigsby presently, breaking the silence, “I’ll have to get Mendenhall.” Mendenhall was the assistant state treasurer, and was counted among the adherents of Grigsby. “Better let me go,” said Jennings, taking up his coat and hat. When he had gone Grigsby again paced the floor. Now he would pause at the window and look down into Sixth Street, where the rain, falling hopelessly and helplessly, was making pools in the depressions of the cedar block pavement that glinted in the white glare of the arc light spluttering before the hotel. Whenever the hoarse sounds of distant locomotive whistles came to him out of the wet night, he jerked forth his watch and sighed as he replaced it. Then he began to worry because Jennings did not reappear. He wondered if Governor Chatham would venture out in such a night to seal the treasury. He cursed Chatham, who had made him, and finally Jennings, who had saved him. Altogether, he passed a very bad two hours. And then Jennings returned. As the tall Egyptian entered the room, Grigsby demanded: “Where you been?”