PEGGY-IN-THE-RAIN
Peter maintained a sympathetic silence. Gordon dropped his cigar in the ash-tray.
"Come on," he said. "Let's go home. I want to walk."
They left Broadway behind them and crossed to the Avenue, an almost deserted and silent canyon above whose rims the stars shone white in a purple April sky. They walked in silence for a while. Then,
"I've a good mind, Pete," Gordon continued quietly, "to oust the whole lot of 'em, to put my own directors in and see if a railroad system can't be run honestly and still make money. Sounds a bit—quixotic, eh?"
"Sounds like horse-sense," growled Peter.
"It would be a fight," reflected Gordon aloud. "Some of 'em would struggle like fiends before they'd let go. Why, hang him, even Lovering smiles at me sadly and shakes his head when I talk about honesty. And he'd be horrified and insulted if I so much as hinted that he wasn't the—the personification of probity!"
"He's a deacon in his church," murmured Peter mildly.
71
