ceed
in everything."

Old Hosie breathed an imprecation that must have made his ancestors,
asleep behind the old Quaker meeting-house down in Buck Creek, gasp in
their grassy, cedar-shaded graves.

"All the same," Katherine added desperately, "we've got to half kill
ourselves trying between now and election day!"

They subsided into silence. In nervous impatience Katherine awaited
the appearance of the pseudo-investor in run-down farms. He seemed a
long time in coming, but the delay was all in her suspense, for as the
Court House clock was tolling the appointed hour Mr. Manning, _alias_
Mr. Hartsell, walked into the office. He was, as Katherine had once
described him to Old Hosie, a quiet, reserved man with that
confidence-inspiring amplitude in the equatorial regions commonly
observable in bank presidents and trusted officials of corporations.

As he closed the door his subdued but confident dignity dropped from
him and he warmly shook hands with Katherine, for this was their first
meeting since their conference in New York six weeks before.

"You must know how very, very terrible our situation is," Katherine
rapidly began. "We've simply _got_ to do something!"

"I certainly haven't done much so far," said Manning, with a rueful
smile. "I'm sorry--but you don't know how tedious my role's been to
me. To act the part of bait, and just lie around before the noses of
the fish you're after, and not get a bite in two whole weeks--that's
not my idea of exciting fishing."

"I know. But the plan looked a good one."

"It looked first-class," conceded Manning. "And, perhaps----"

"With election only four days off, we've simply got to do something!"
Katherine repeated. "If nothing else, let's drop that plan, devise a
new one, and stake our hopes on some wild chance."

"Wait a minute," said Manning. "I wouldn't drop that plan just yet.
I've gone two weeks without a bite, but--I'm not sure--remember I say
I'm not sure--but I think that at last I may possibly have a nibble."

"A nibble you say?" cried Katherine, leaning eagerly forward.

"At least, the cork bobbed under."

"When?"

"Last night."

"Last night? Tell me about it!"

"Well, of late I've been making my study of the water-works more and
more obvious, and I've half suspected that I've been watched, though I
was too uncertain to risk raising any false hopes by sending you word
about it. But yesterday afternoon Blind Charlie Peck--he's been
growing friendl