"Got him," announced the clerk presently, as if he had trapped a rat, and stood expectantly aside. To his disappointment Shelby merely made an immediate appointment at the Bowers's home. More bitter still, he took the message with him. "Lightning has struck," Shelby greeted the old man ten minutes later, handing him the telegram. "I've been ordered down to the Boss. This means make or break." The Hon. Seneca Bowers unslung his glasses and slowly read the summons. "I guess it had to come," he commented. "Oh, yes. Things have reached lowest ebb. In fact, they're so low that you must put up my car fare." Bowers assented readily. "Whatever you need you shall have, Ross. You must go in good style." Shelby pocketed the sum which he thought would meet his travelling expenses and listened to his friend's rather dolorous words of encouragement. "I think he'll do right by you," Bowers concluded feebly. "I think he'll do right." Shelby jerked a grim smile. "The Boss always does right--when it pays." In the smoking-room of the Pullman that night the traveller was accosted by an unctuous person who looked like a race-track tout. He would have described himself as a man "interested" in legislation; he had been described by other people as a lobbyist, but that was in the days before the machine absorbed the lobby. "And how does the Hon. Calvin Ross Shelby find himself?" beamed the new-comer, dropping into a seat alongside. "Busy days in Tuscarora, eh?" "Yes; busy days, Krantz," assented the harassed man, concealing his annoyance under a cordial greeting. If ever he had needed a quiet hour it was now, and he had sought the smoking-compartment because with a carful of women and children it seemed to promise solitude. "Shall miss you around Albany this winter," Krantz said feelingly, exploring the pockets of his horsey waistcoat for a cigar. "We always got along so well together." Shelby was silent under this moving reminiscence. "I'll have some of my Washington friends look you up," pursued the man. "They're good fellows, all of 'em." "Thanks," said Shelby, without enthusiasm. "Better wait till I'm elected." "My dear sir, can you doubt? Your resplendent gonfalon, if I may so express myself, has ever been Victory's chosen perch." "I've pulled a majority hitherto." "And you will, you will. In fact"--his voice fell--"we think it such a foregone conclusion that one of my friends who is looking over the prospective House wants to make your acquaintance. You're sure to jibe. He's interested in the unlucky River and Harbor scheme." "Oh." Krantz looked out at him from underneath his saurian lids, and blew a smoke ring toward the rococo ceiling.