Page:The gold brick (1910).djvu/227

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the profit of any one man, but for the good of the party alone, and so invested it with the enthusiasm of what passes for patriotism in a nation where party is set above country. He told the landlord of the Grand that he would be responsible for the rent of the two rooms he had engaged next his own. He already owed the landlord.

The night before the primaries a crowd, foul with the reek of tobacco, alcohol and perspiration, was shuffling about in the hall and anterooms of the colonel's headquarters. The crowd was noisy, profane and confident. But inside, the steering committee was assembled, and it was very sober. Garwood, at the littered table, had been scratching his head over political equations.

Conventions had been held in all the thirty-six outside districts, and sixty-nine candidates had been nominated, fifty-five representatives and fourteen senators. Of these they could depend upon twenty-nine. It requires fifty-two to control a legislative caucus, when the party has a bare majority on joint ballot, so they would have to nominate at least twenty-three of their candidates in Cook County to get a caucus majority, assuming the ultimate elec-