Ames retired to the check-room. As the clerk's footsteps died out in the hall overhead, he heard a chair dragged across the tessellated floor, and peering out from his place of hiding, he saw McPherson by the aid of this chair reach the office clock and resolutely turn the hands back twenty minutes. This accomplished, McPherson took himself into the open air. He raced down the road toward the telegraph office. Here Ames found him fifteen minutes later scribbling away at one corner of the operator's deal table. He glanced up as Ames entered the room. “Oh, Mr. Ames,” he said, “look from the window and tell me when the coach from the hotel arrives.” Even as he spoke they heard the shriek of the engine's whistle. McPherson sighed softly. “I'm afraid Mr. Smith has missed his train,” he said. “And I think he was quite anxious to catch it.” Twenty minutes slipped by and there was a hasty step upon the threshold, and James Cartwright Smith burst into the room. “Here, rush these telegrams!” he roared, and tossed a dozen sheets of paper in front of the operator. “The wire's busy, Mr. Smith,” said McPherson mildly, so mildly there was almost a touch of sadness in his tone. The great man turned to the operator. “Throw this stuff out of the window, or I will, and send those wires.” McPherson measured the politician with a large prominent eye, then he said in a tone that would have carried conviction to a less excited man than Smith: “If you do that, you'll go after it, and it's twenty feet to the ground.” For answer Smith made a grab at the pile of copy in front of the operator. McPherson shot up to his full height of six feet, and extending a long arm, seized him by the wrist. “It's twenty feet to the ground, Mr. Smith,” he remonstrated. Smith swung about on his heel. “How can I get away from here, Ames?” he asked. “You'll have to wait until eleven-ten to-morrow,” said Ames cheerfully. The leader groaned aloud. “Come,” Ames added, “you go to the hotel with me, and we'll be back here after lunch.” But once he had coaxed Smith back to The Pines, he abandoned him and hurried again to the telegraph office. “See here, McPherson,” he expostulated, “it's all right where Smith is concerned, but how about me?” “I'd love to oblige you, Mr. Ames; later, perhaps.” “But that won't do any good,” urged Ames impatiently. “No, I suppose not, since the News is an evening paper.” “And what's the Clarion?” “Semi-weekly,” said the secretary pleasantly. The secretary wrote telegrams to the Clarion until he wearied of that pastime; then he began to tear pages out of his copy of Emerson. Incidentally he and Ames had passed to a state of siege. It became necessary to spike the office door fast to the jamb to keep out James Cartwright Smith, who, supported by a bell boy and the night watchman from The Pines, had established himself in the narrow hall, where he kept the air thick with threats and curses.