He knew where the shell of that selfishness had been broken—­it was cracked in the meeting where his chivalry had received its call to arms in behalf of the helpless.  Those men had gazed at him, had told their troubles—­and had left it all to his conscience!  He did not believe those men were shrewd enough to understand so exactly in what fashion he could be snared in their affairs.

“Confound that rascal who inveigled me there!” ran his mental anathema of the strange young man.  “He must have been the devil, wearing that frock-coat to hide his forked tail.  And here I am now, fighting for peace of mind!”

And his struggle for his peace of mind drove him, at last, to set his hat very straight on his head and march across the street to Colonel Symonds Dodd’s office.

The Honorable Archer Converse had made up his mind that no influence in the world could pull or push him into politics.  He held firmly fixed convictions as to what would happen to a good man in politics.  To get office this man of principle would be obliged to fight manipulators with their own choice of weapons.  And once in office, all his motives would be mocked and his movements assailed.  Converse was a keen man who had studied men; he was not one of those amiable theorists who believe that the People always have sense enough in the mass to turn to and elect the right men for rulers.  He understood perfectly well that accomplishing real things in politics is not a game of tossing rose-petals.

He went to call on Colonel Dodd.  He went with the lofty purpose of a patriotic citizen, resolved to exhort the colonel to clean house.  It seemed to be quite the natural thing to do, now that the idea had occurred to him.  Certainly Colonel Dodd would listen to reason—­would wake up when the thing was presented to him in the right manner; he must understand that new fashions had come to stay in these days of reform.

Thinking it all over, considering that really the matter of this water-supply and attendant monopoly of franchises had become an evil, that the prospects of the party would be endangered if the party leaders continued to nurse this evil, Mr. Converse was certain that he and the colonel would be able to arrange for reform, by letting the colonel do the reforming.

They faced each other.  Their respective attitudes told much!

Colonel Dodd filled his chair in front of his desk, using all the space in it, swelling into all its concavities—­usurping it all.

The Honorable Archer Converse sat very straight, his shoulders not touching his chair-back.

Physically they represented extremes; mentally, morally, and in political ethics they were as divergent as their physical attributes.

“I’m sorry that you were able to take those Danburg men into camp,” said Mr. Converse, couching his lance promptly and in plain sight like an honorable antagonist.  “I had been retained and proposed to expose conditions in the management of water systems.”