"Who?" demanded Mr. Early sharply, looking up.
"Primarily this infernal next-door neighbor of yours."
"Percival?"
"Percival. He's too much of a kid to put himself forward, but he's
really the whole thing. He's been sneaking around town for months,
picking up information. He has a confounded cheerful way of making
friends that has cut him out for the job of politics, if he would just
put himself on the right side. Of course he has no more idea of
practical politics than--" Mr. Murdock looked around for an object of
comparison and concluded lamely, "than that girl on your magazine cover.
And what do you think is the latest?"
"What?"
"He's stirred up that mare's nest of a dude club till they've taken to
sending a committee to attend every meeting of the council--which is
irritating."
"But not necessarily serious."
"Not in itself, though it's getting on Barry's nerves, as you people of
fashion say. To tell you the truth, I've had to make a concession to
Barry, just to keep him in order. I preferred him right on the council
where he is, but he's got a bee in his top-hat. He wants to run for
mayor. I suppose he wants to show people what a great man he really is.
I gave in to him on that point. Now here comes in the thing that made me
look you up. Barry has some sort of an acquaintance with this Percival
fellow, and when he proclaimed his intentions, Percival jumped on him
with a flat defiance--told him that he had proof of a disreputable
affair in Barry's career that would queer him with the whole community.
How your neighbor got hold of this thing, I'm jiggered if I can guess. I
thought I was the only man in the city that knew it, and it has been my
chief club to keep Barry in order. But however he got them, Percival's
facts were all square, and Barry collapsed. Now, these two patched up an
agreement. Barry promised to give up his candidacy for mayor, and stay
in his seat in the council, and Percival, on his part, agreed to keep
quiet."
"Well, that suits you all right."
"It would if it ended there, but what I started out to tell you is this:
the Municipal Club is beginning to take up city politics in earnest.
They are organizing systematically in every ward to be ready for a fight
for the council in next fall's election, and, to cap the climax, I was
told to-day that they had succeeded in getting Preston to run for mayor.
Now you know they could hardly have picked out a worse man, so far as we
are concerned. Preston is popular and strong, and he's perfectly
unapproachable. I'd as soon tackle the law of gravitation. It isn't even
pleasant for respectable citizens, like you and me, to come out publicly
against the whole movement. We can't afford to do it. Everything we do
has got to be done on the quiet."