re a Turkish
decoration, so I went after this one."

Peter regarded his young friend with incredulous admiration.

"But did they believe you," he demanded, "when you told them you were an
author and educator?"

Stetson closed one eye and grinned. "They believed whatever I paid them
to believe."

"If you can get one of those," cried Peter, "Old man Gilman ought to
get a dozen. I'll tell them he's the author of the longest and dullest
history of their flea-bitten empire that was ever written. And he's a
real professor and a real author, and I can prove it. I'll show them the
five volumes with his name in each. How much did that thing cost you?"

"Two hundred dollars in bribes," said Stetson briskly, "and two months
of diplomacy."

"I haven't got two months for diplomacy," said Peter, "so I'll have to
increase the bribes. I'll stay here and get the decoration for Gilman,
and you work the papers at home. No one ever heard of the Order of the
Crescent, but that only makes it the easier for us. They'll only know
what we tell them, and we'll tell them it's the highest honor ever
bestowed by a reigning sovereign upon an American scholar. If you tell
the people often enough that anything is the best they believe you.
That's the way father sells his hams. You've been a press-agent.
From now on you're going to be my press-agent--I mean Doctor Gilman's
press-agent. I pay your salary, but your work is to advertise him and
the Order of the Crescent. I'll give you a letter to Charley Hines at
Stillwater. He sends out college news to a syndicate and he's the local
Associated Press man. He's sore at their discharging Gilman and he's my
best friend, and he'll work the papers as far as you like. Your job is
to make Stillwater College and Doctor Black and my father believe that
when they lost Gilman they lost the man who made Stillwater famous.
And before we get through boosting Gilman, we'll make my father's
million-dollar gift laboratory look like an insult."

In the eyes of the former press-agent the light of battle burned
fiercely, memories of his triumphs in exploitation, of his strategies
and tactics in advertising soared before him.

"It's great!" he exclaimed. "I've got your idea and you've got me. And
you're darned lucky to get me. I've been press-agent for politicians,
actors, society leaders, breakfast foods, and horse-shows--and I'm the
best! I was in charge of the publicity bureau for Galloway when he
ran for governo