"Gee," he said—"some story this morning. A greenhorn bank-examiner, who didn't know his A B C, dropped into Ex-Governor Billings' bank yesterday and found a pretty mess. The old boy never had a bank-examiner come in unexpectedly like that before in his long and useful life. It nearly gave him apoplexy. And he just putting up his name for the Senate. But this blundering bank-examiner was not such a fool after all. The story goes that Billings had to come across with an awful wad to hush him up."
"Why? Did the examiner find something wrong?" Yetta asked.
"Yes, my child," O'Rourke said with playful pity. "He was that foolish."
"What did he find?" Yetta persisted.
"Unsecured loans. Billings had been lending himself the depositors' money, using his calling card as collateral."
"What'll happen to Billings?"
"It's a shame for you to go around town without a nurse," O'Rourke teased her. "It was decided a long time ago that Billings was to be the next United States Senator from the glorious State of New York. A little accident like this can't be allowed to interfere."
"It's a rotten shame," Cowan said. He was old enough not to have to try to appear blasé. "They're going too strong—putting over a crook like that on the people. Everybody with any memory knows his record. In the good old days when yellow journalism was just beginning, before we got so respectable we couldn't print the truth, we showed Billings up—how he came through for the railroads on that Death Avenue grade crossing."
"Oh, that's ancient history. It's only six months ago—" another reporter began. One after another they added details to the Ex-Governor's record of infamy. But that afternoon's paper contained a eulogistic article on his patriotic achievement. An editorial which Yetta knew O'Rourke had written praised him to the skies, and said the people of the State were to be congratulated that so worthy a man had consented to accept the nomination. Yetta could not understand the psychology of these men who, having in hand the evidence to defeat an unworthy candidate for public office, did not use it. This was worse than cynicism—it was shameful.
As she was leaving the office a few days later, Cowan rode down in the elevator with her.