“It's that pit-viper, Henry Clay!” cries the General. “Major, the pet employment of that scoundrel is the vindication of good women!”
Wizard Lewis holds to a different view. He declares that the secret impulse of this base war is Statesman Calhoun, and proves it as events unfold.
“And yet,” asks the General, “why should he assail little Peg? Both he and Mrs. Calhoun called upon her and Major Eaton, and congratulated them on their marriage.”
“That was while Major Eaton was a senator,” Wizard Lewis responds, “and before he became War Secretary and got in the way of the Calhoun plans. Your Vice-President, General, is mad to be President. Also, he is so blurred in his strategy as to imagine that these attacks on little Peg will advance his prospects.”
The General snorts suspiciously; a light breaks upon him.
“Then your theory is,” he says, “that Calhoun assails Peg as a step toward the presidency.”
“Precisely, General! Rightly construed, it is not an attack on Peg, but you. He is trying to put you before the people in the role of one who countenances the immoral, and upholds a bad woman. In that he hopes to array every virtuous fireside against you. He looks for you to ask a second term; and, by any means in his power, he will strive to destroy you out of his path.”
“Now, was there ever such infamy!” cries the General. “Here is a man so vile that he would pave his way to the White House with the slain honor of a woman!”
The hate of the General is now focused upon Statesman Calhoun. That ignoble strategist, he resolves, shall never achieve the presidency.
As one wherewith to defeat Statesman Calhoun and succeed himself, the General picks upon Cabineteer Van Buren—that suave one, who is so much to the urbane fore for the pretty Peg.