me to-day
at my club. It is close by. You can wait there for news of the court's
decision as well as anywhere else, and I should like to show you the
place. I have just joined."

At the club, when the four men were seated at a small table in the round
window of the main room, Lyman's popularity with all classes was very
apparent. Hardly a man entered that did not call out a salutation to
him, some even coming over to shake his hand. He seemed to be every
man's friend, and to all he seemed equally genial. His affability, even
to those whom he disliked, was unfailing.

"See that fellow yonder," he said to Magnus, indicating a certain
middle-aged man, flamboyantly dressed, who wore his hair long, who
was afflicted with sore eyes, and the collar of whose velvet coat was
sprinkled with dandruff, "that's Hartrath, the artist, a man absolutely
devoid of even the commonest decency. How he got in here is a mystery to
me."

Yet, when this Hartrath came across to say "How do you do" to Lyman,
Lyman was as eager in his cordiality as his warmest friend could have
expected.

"Why the devil are you so chummy with him, then?" observed Harran when
Hartrath had gone away.

Lyman's explanation was vague. The truth of the matter was, that
Magnus's oldest son was consumed by inordinate ambition. Political
preferment was his dream, and to the realisation of this dream
popularity was an essential. Every man who could vote, blackguard or
gentleman, was to be conciliated, if possible. He made it his study to
become known throughout the entire community--to put influential men
under obligations to himself. He never forgot a name or a face. With
everybody he was the hail-fellow-well-met. His ambition was not trivial.
In his disregard for small things, he resembled his father. Municipal
office had no attraction for him. His goal was higher. He had planned
his life twenty years ahead. Already Sheriff's Attorney, Assistant
District Attorney and Railroad Commissioner, he could, if he desired,
attain the office of District Attorney itself. Just now, it was a
question with him whether or not it would be politic to fill this
office. Would it advance or sidetrack him in the career he had outlined
for himself? Lyman wanted to be something better than District Attorney,
better than Mayor, than State Senator, or even than member of the United
States Congress. He wanted to be, in fact, what his father was only in
name--to succeed where Magnus had fail