And now the stage had been reached at which my ten mutinous clients could be, and must be, disciplined.

As a first step, I resigned the chairmanship of the state committee and ordered the election of Woodruff to the vacancy. I should soon have substituted Woodruff for myself, in any event. I had never wanted the place, and had taken it only because to refuse it would have been to throw away the golden opportunity Dunkirk so unexpectedly thrust at me. Holding that position, or any other officially connecting me with my party's machine, made me a target; and I wished to be completely hidden, for I wished the people of my state to think me merely one of the party servants, in sympathy with the rank and file rather than with the machine. Yet, in the chairmanship, in the targetship, I must have a man whom I could trust through and through; and, save Woodruff, who was there for the place?

When my resignation was announced, the independent and the opposition press congratulated me on my high principle in refusing to have any official connection with the machine responsible for such infamies. When Woodruff's election was announced it came as a complete surprise. Such of the newspapers as dared, and they were few, denounced it as infamy's crown of infamy; and the rank and file of the party was shocked,—as I had known it would be. He made not a murmur, but I knew what must be in his mind. I said nothing until six weeks or two months had passed; then I went straight at him.

"You are feeling bitter against me," said I. "You think I dropped out when there was danger of heavy firing, and put you up to take it."

"No, indeed, Senator," he protested, "nothing like that. Honestly, I have not had a bitter thought against you. I'm depressed simply because, just as I had a chance to get on my feet again, they won't let me."

"But," I rejoined, "I did resign and put you in my place because I didn't want to take the fire and thought you could."

"And so I can," said he. "I haven't any reputation to lose. I'm no worse off than I was before. Let 'em do their damnedest."

"Your first campaign will probably be a failure," I went on, "and, the day after election, there'll be a shout for your head."

He shrugged his shoulders. "I'm enlisted for the war," said he. "You're my general. I go where you order."

I hope the feelings that surged up in me showed in my face, as I stretched out my hand. "Thank you, Doc," said I. "And—there's another side to it. It isn't all black."

"It isn't black at all," he replied stoutly.

I explained: "I've wanted you to have the place from the outset. But I shouldn't dare give it to you except at a time like this, when our party has done so many unpopular things that one more won't count; and there's so much to be said against us, so much worse things than they can possibly make out your election to be, that it'll soon be almost neglected."

"They're beginning to drop me already and go back to harrying those poor devils of ours in the legislature," said Woodruff.

"A few weeks more," I went on, "and you'll be safe and you are to stay chairman, no matter what happens. When they have leisure to attack you, there'll be nothing to attack. The people will have dismissed the matter from their minds. They don't care to watch the threshing of old straw."

I saw that I had lifted a weight from him, though he said nothing.

So much for my first move toward the chastening of my clients. Further and even more effective in the same direction, I cut down our campaign fund for the legislative ticket to one-fifth what it usually was; and, without even Woodruff's knowing it, I heavily subsidized the opposition machine. Wherever it could be done with safety I arranged for the trading off of our legislative ticket for our candidate for governor. "The legislature is hopelessly lost," I told Woodruff; "we must concentrate on the governorship. We must save what we can." In fact, so overwhelmingly was our party in the majority, and so loyal were its rank and file, that it was only by the most careful arrangement of weak candidates and of insufficient campaign funds that I was able to throw the legislature to the opposition. Our candidate for governor, Walbrook—Burbank was ineligible to a second successive term—was elected by a comfortable plurality. And, by the way, I saw to it that the party organs gave Woodruff enthusiastic praise for rescuing so much from what had looked like utter ruin.

My clients had been uneasy ever since the furious popular outburst which had followed their breaking away from my direction and restraint. When they saw an opposition legislature, they readily believed what they read in the newspapers about the "impending reign of radicalism." Silliman, the opposition leader, had accepted John Markham's offer of one hundred and fifty thousand dollars for Croffut's seat in the Senate; but I directed him to send Veerhoft, one of the wildest and cleverest of the opposition radicals. He dared not disobey me. Veerhoft went, and Markham never saw again the seventy-five thousand he had paid Silliman as a "retainer."

Veerhoft in the United States Senate gave my clients the chills; but I was preparing the fever for them also. I had Silliman introduce bills in both houses of the legislature that reached for the privileges of the big corporations and initiated proceedings to expose their corruption. I had Woodruff suggest to Governor Walbrook that, in view of the popular clamor, he ought to recommend measures for equalizing taxation and readjusting the prices of franchises. As my clients were bonded and capitalized on the basis of no expense either for taxes or for franchises, the governor's suggestion, eagerly adopted by Silliman's "horde," foreshadowed ruin. If the measures should be passed, all the dividends and interest they were paying on "water" would go into the public treasury.

My clients came to me, singly and in pairs, to grovel and to implore. An interesting study these arrogant gentlemen made as they cringed, utterly indifferent to the appearance of self-respect, in their agony for their imperiled millions. A mother would shrink from abasing herself to save the life of her child as these men abased themselves in the hope of saving their dollars. How they fawned and flattered! They begged my pardon for having disregarded my advice; they assured me that, if I would only exert that same genius of mine which had conceived the combine, I could devise some way of saving them from this tidal wave of popular clamor,—for they hadn't a suspicion of my part in making that tidal wave.

Reluctantly I consented to "see what I can do."

The instant change in the atmosphere of the capital, the instant outcry from the organs of both parties that "the people had voted for reform, not for confiscatory revolution," completed my demonstration. My clients realized who was master of the machines. The threatening storm rapidly scattered; the people, relieved that the Silliman program of upheaval was not to be carried out, were glad enough to see the old "conservative" order restored,—our people always reason that it is better to rot slowly by corruption than to be frightened to death by revolution.

"Hereafter, we must trust to your judgment in these political matters, Harvey," said Roebuck. "The manager must be permitted to manage."

I smiled at the ingenuousness of this speech. It did not ruffle me. Roebuck was one of those men who say their prayers in a patronizing tone.

Yes, I was master. But it is only now, in the retrospect of years, that I have any sense of triumph; for I had won the supremacy with small effort, comparatively,—with the small effort required of him who sees the conditions of a situation clearly, and, instead of trying to combat or to change them, intelligently uses them to his ends. Nor do I now regard my achievement as marvelous. Everything was in my favor; against me, there was nothing,—no organization, no plan, no knowledge of my aim. I wonder how much of their supernal glory would be left to the world's men of action, from its Alexanders and Napoleons down to its successful bandits and ward-bosses, if mankind were in the habit of looking at what the winner had opposed to him,—Alexander faced only by flocks of sheep-like Asiatic slaves; Napoleon routing the badly trained, wretchedly officered soldiers of decadent monarchies; and the bandit or ward-boss overcoming peaceful and unprepared and unorganized citizens. Who would erect statues or write eulogies to a man for mowing a field of corn-stalks with a scythe? Mankind is never more amusing than in its hero-worship.

No, I should simply have been stupid had I failed.

But—even had I been disposed to rein in and congratulate myself at the quarter-stretch, I could not have done it. A man has, perhaps, some choice as to his mount before he enters the race for success. But once in the saddle and off, he must let the reins go; his control is confined to whip and spur.