God," she prayed, clasping her hands tightly and lifting tear-stained eyes, "help me to be firm."
When, considerably agitated, the young man got back to his desk, it was twenty minutes past ten by the ivory clock on the blotter—twenty-one minutes past, to be exact, and a few seconds. He sat taking stock of his position. Scanlon and all the other back-scratchers were against him. Billie was against him. Mr. Boland was aloof and accusatory. Certain handpicked individuals in the community were reproaching him—but the people! The people generally trusted and believed in him. His great popularity in the community was secure, and this was the sole necessary asset in his battle for justice for Adam John.
That was exactly what he was thinking, when just then the people—that is, just then a long-distance call came in from the state capitol. It was Charlie Clayton, one of the people's representatives, speaking: "That McKenzie's Tongue matter has been set forward to tonight, Henry," said Charlie, and his voice sounded anxious, a bit overwrought. "We're going to need every vote we can dig up; and it's a good three hours run up here, you know."
"I'll be there," assured Henry; and it was a kind of relief to have his attention diverted to a duty that was easy to perform; but—"McKenzie's Tongue!" he suddenly remembered. "Why, Sarah Murphy was in here telling me that deal was crooked."
There before him was the pile of papers she had left to prove her assertion. For half an hour he was hunched over them; and that night in the Assembly Room he denounced the McKenzie's Tongue project as a job and voted against it, but was careful to deny
