g."

Anne glanced down. "They are doing it very quietly," she reassured. "No
fuss at all."

Because of a straight-eyed sincerity and a candid vigour which endowed
him with a forcefulness beyond his years, and because a certain
deliberate humour played in his eyes and flashed occasionally into his
ungarrulous speech, he found himself smiled upon with the tolerant
approval of the older ladies and the point-blank delight of the younger.

Back at his desk the next morning he was again the grave-eyed and
industrious young utility man, but in his breast pocket was a crumpled
rosebud which to him still had fragrant life. In his mind were certain
rich memories and in his veins raced hot currents of love--pitched to a
new exhilaration.

Victor McCalloway had become again the lone man of the mountains, and
Boone burned with anxiety to go to him there, but the soldier had
prohibited that just now. The boy had put his hand to the plough of a
virulent city campaign, and until the furrow was turned he must stay
there with the men who were making the fight.

"For you, my boy," he had declared, with a live interest that ran to
emphasis, "this is an opportunity not to be missed. It is a phase of
transition, not only in your own development but in that of your State
and your country. Through all of it sounds the insistent message of the
future: whoever takes into his hands public affairs must give to the
public a conscientious accounting. This is a declaration of war on the
old, slothfully accepted dogma that to the victor belongs the spoils.
It is Humanity's plea for a place in government."

When McCalloway had gone, Boone carried into the steps and developments
of that autumn's activities a freshly galvanized sense of romance and of
high adventure. Through the labour of each day thrilled the thought of
Anne, and the quiet triumph of being no longer "poor white trash."

In the forces of the political enemy clinging doggedly to the spoils of
long possession and sticking at no desperate effort, the boy discovered
much that was not mean--rather was it picturesque with a sort of Robin
Hood flavour and the drama of a passing order. Here were the
twentieth-century counterparts of the gentlemen-gamblers of the old
Mississippi steamboat days, a gentry bold and mendacious, unable to
perceive that what had been must not for that reason continue to be.

Often Boone went to hear Morgan delivering his philippics to street
corner audiences,