He realized that he had been a spectacle inciting interest and some amusement while he was hammering on the door.

One object of the Duke had been attained when he admitted Everett—­the wrangling ceased.  But the embarrassment was intensified.  The situation was more complex.

“I beg your pardon, gentlemen, if I am interrupting serious business,” began Everett, intending to force some sort of explanation.

He waited.  No one spoke.  The others were waiting, too.

The candidate looked from one to the other, and then surveyed Wasgatt and the papers he was clutching.  He eyed General Waymouth with much interest and some surprise.  He had not been informed of that gentleman’s presence in the hotel.  The General returned the gaze with serenity, creasing his sheet of manuscript on the table with his thin fingers.

“I expected to be called in when you were ready to go over the platform,” continued Everett, sourly.  “I’m supposed to know as early as any one, I presume, what it is I’m going to stand on.”

Thelismer Thornton decided that it was up to him to speak.  He leaned against the table, half sitting on it, and swung his foot.

“You have a perfect right, Dave, to inquire about any platform that you’re going to stand on.  And when we get your platform ready for you we’ll call you in and submit it.  But allow me to remind you that you haven’t been nominated yet.”  The band was blaring again outside.  “The convention is yet to be held, and has yet to declare its platform.”

“I don’t expect you to call Arba Spinney in here and consult with him—­if that’s what your hints mean.  But there’s no need of your using that ’round-the-barn talk with me, Thelismer.  You know that so far as the real Republican party is concerned Spinney is an outsider; I’m the logical candidate, and I demand to be taken into the conference.  I don’t recognize that there are two Republican candidates before the convention.”

“I do,” said the Duke, firmly and with significance.  He was preparing to resent this autocratic manner.

“Well, I don’t!” cried the State chairman.  Secretly he had been offended by Thornton’s high-handed assumption of control, ever since their talk on the morning after the Fort Canibas caucus.  He had promptly recognized the political sagacity of the old man’s plan.  In his fear of the Spinney agitation—­in his apprehension lest all control should be wrested from his faction of the party—­he had been eager to compromise on General Waymouth, hoping that he would prove to be as amenable to party reason as he knew Everett already was.  But this intractable old Spartan, with his dictation of party principles that meant the loss of policy, power, and profits, had angered him to his marrow.  He was ready to declare himself now, Thornton or mo Thornton.  He turned on the Duke.

“Perhaps you can lick me—­that’s the only way you can get it!” he declared.  “But you needn’t expect me to stand here and grin and hand it over.”