r?"

"Yes, we must get definitely to work tomorrow morning," added Joyce.

"Certainly, nine--or half past eight, if you choose," said Mann. "In the
meantime I will try to recall the minutest particulars of my connection
with this office. I am sure, my dear lady, you do not need to be assured
of my loyalty to you--nor to my native city. And now--I bid you
good-day." He bowed impressively and was gone.

"All the same, I don't like the cut of his jib," murmured Bailey.

"Oh, he's too much of a trimmer to go back on us now," said Joyce.
"Public sentiment is all on our side now, and election day's coming."

Gertrude smiled. "I can't imagine why anybody should trim his sails to
get an office," she said.

"Well, see what a dangerous thing it is to cultivate a taste for
politics," retorted Bailey. "There's no knowledge where it may lead
you."

"Oh, Miss Van Deusen will have a walkover when her turn for election
comes again."

Gertrude remembered this remark as she sat in her library that evening,
alone for the first time since she had set forth to call on Newton
Fitzgerald.

"Having set my hand to the plough," (her favorite expression) "I suppose
I must not look back," she soliloquized, "until the end of the furrow is
reached. But I may look forward, and--if I live through the next few
months, I wonder if anything or anybody can persuade me to be a
candidate the second time. I don't think so now. But how much more I
know than I did last year!--only, of course, I cannot own it to any
living soul. John Allingham ought to have beaten me. I wonder if he will
run next year?" But in her heart she knew very well he would not oppose
her again. "He would make an ideal mayor. Upright, honorable,
fearless--and afraid of nothing but doing wrong. Ah, well--should it
always take a man to deal with men--or shouldn't it? I don't know."

The maid entered.

"A man wishes to see you, Miss Van Deusen," said she. "He says he must
talk to you personally. His name is Fitzgerald. But if you're too tired,
Miss Van Deusen, I'll make him wait. If you'll excuse my saying so--you
are too worn-down. These people ask too much of you."

"Show him right in here, Lizzie," answered Gertrude. "And don't worry
about me. I'm all right, now I am home."

A moment later Fitzgerald entered and stood, hat in hand.

"Excuse me, Miss Van Deusen," he began apologetically. "I've got
something to confess--and I can't wait until morning--it'll be too late
th