On the other hand, Senator Henderson’s party had the cloak of respectability on its shoulders.  His lieutenants were prominent business men who went into politics as a light diversion, young men of aristocratic families who were ambitious to go to Albany or Washington, and lawyers.  The senator was a shrewd politician, with an unreadable face, clean-shaven but for a stubby mustache, and keen blue eyes that saw everything.  He was loyal to his party and above dishonesty.

This was the political situation in Herculaneum.

One May evening the senator called up Warrington.  He was told that Mr. Warrington was at the club.  The senator drove to the club forthwith.  He found the dramatist in the reading-room, and greeted him pleasantly.

“My boy, I want half an hour of your time.”

“You are welcome to an hour of it, Senator,” replied Warrington, curious to know what the senator had to say to him.

“Come into a private dining-room, then.”  Once seated at the table, the senator reached over and touched Warrington mysteriously on the arm.  “Young man, I heard you speak the other night at the Chamber of Commerce banquet.  You’re a born orator, and what is better than that, you’ve common sense and humor.  How would you like to be mayor of Herculaneum next fall?”

“Mayor?” gasped Warrington.

“Yes.”

“I’d make a fine mayor,” with forced laughter, but thinking rapidly.  “Aren’t you jollying me, Senator?”

“I’m dead in earnest, Warrington.  There is not another available man in sight.  By available I mean a man who can pull the party out of the bog.  There are a hundred I could nominate, but the nomination would be as far as they could go.  We want a man who is fresh and new to the people, so far as politics goes; a man who can not be influenced by money or political emoluments.  There are thousands of voters who are discontented, but they’d prefer to vote for Donnelly again rather than to vote for some one they know would be no better.  You are known the world over.  A good many people would never have known there was such a place as Herculaneum but for you.  It is the home of the distinguished playwright.”

“But I know practically nothing about political machinery,” Warrington protested.

“You can leave the machinery to me,” said the senator wisely.  “I’ll set the wheels going.  It will be as easy as sliding down hill.  I’ll give you my word, if you land in the City Hall, to send you to Washington with the next Congress.  Will you accept the nomination, in case I swing it around to you in September?  It’s a big thing.  All you literary boys are breaking into politics.  This is your chance.”

“I’ll take the night to think it over,” said Warrington.  He was vastly flattered, but he was none the less cautious and non-committal.

“Take a week, my boy; take a week.  Another thing.  You are intimate with young Bennington.  He’s a hard-headed chap and doesn’t countenance politics in his shops.  The two of you ought to bring the hands to their senses.  If we can line up the Bennington steel-mills, others will fall in.  Bennington owns the shops, but our friend McQuade owns the men who work there.  Take a week to think it over; I can rely on your absolute secrecy.”