She didn’t send for Hal this time. She didn’t want to see him. She was afraid he might put a stop to her electioneering activities. But if there was another enlisted man in Company E whom she did not interview on the subject of the approaching election it was because, after diligent search, she couldn’t possibly find him. When Hal heard about it he went to her and protested. “For goodness’ sake, Aunt Sarah,” he exclaimed, “stop it!” “Stop what?” she inquired, with assumed innocence. “This electioneering business. You’re queering the whole thing. It’s one of the unwritten rules of the service that ‘military merit alone gives any right to claim military preferment.’ The idea of a man’s aunt making him ridiculous by going around soliciting votes for him from every member of the company!” “Well,” she replied, “you needn’t go into a decline over it. I couldn’t raise a promise out of a single mother’s son of ’em!” “Of course you couldn’t. It’s one of the unwritten rules of the service that an enlisted man shall not tell for whom he is going to vote in a company election.” “There you go with your ‘unwritten rules’ again. What do I care for ‘unwritten rules,’ or written ones either for that matter? You’ve got to win this election; and if you do win it, somebody’s got to electioneer for you. You’re positively no good at all at soliciting votes for yourself.” “I know. I don’t want to be elected as a result of soliciting votes for myself. I want to be elected on my merit as a soldier, or not at all.” “Fiddlesticks! You haven’t the faintest conception of your duty to yourself. Why, Ben Barriscale is pulling every string he can get his fingers on. His father and his mother and his sister and his sweetheart are all out campaigning for him with bells on. Somebody’s got to do something for you, young man, or you’ll get left as sure as your name’s Halpert McCormack!” But, at the end of the interview, impressed with Hal’s argument against her undue activities, she promised to be more circumspect in the promotion of his cause, and he had to be satisfied with that. Sergeant McCormack had expressed a wish that there should be no open propaganda in his behalf. He felt that an aggressive fight might develop into a bitter one, and that such a campaign would not be “for the good of the service.”