Page:The gold brick (1910).djvu/163

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  • ing, which is the direst necessity that can befall a

candidate. He encountered Halliday in the Square one day, and blazed forth:

"You're gittin' too smart 'round this town all to onct, young feller. You know more'n your pap a'ready, an' if he can't l'arn ye no respec' fer yer elders, I will." He shook a palsied fist at the youth, as he added, in a tone almost pitiable: "An' I'll tell him jest what you done, too."

Defeat might have killed the old man, and the campaign was beginning to tell on him. But when they raised the fund, it was as a hot and sweetened toddy to warm the cockles of his heart. While he had no adequate concept of it, and while the manner of its working was a mystery to him, he did not doubt its efficacy. He felt safe. Also, as the subject of the only campaign fund Gordon County had ever known, he felt a supreme importance, which swelled out his chest and filled him with a ripe content. He even found himself taking the opposition with some zest, now that it was certain to be non-effective. Three days more, thought the squire, and it would be all over. He imagined some sort of civic triumph for himself. He dreamed of a ser-