“Judge,” said Jim, “I’ve been invited to help beat you at the next election.”
“Um!”
“They tell me a corporation hasn’t a chance with you.”
“Some hain’t,” said Zaanan, briefly.
“And that a laboring-man gets all the best of it.”
“An even chance is the best of it for a poor feller,” said Zaanan. “Calc’late you was fetchin’ me news?” The old man’s eyes twinkled. “Moran’s a convincin’ talker,” he observed, after a brief pause.
Jim made no reply.
“Thinkin’ of throwin’ in with him?” Zaanan asked.
Jim started to speak, but stopped, startled. It seemed to him for an instant that Marie Ducharme sat before him. He could see her move with the wonderful grace that was hers; he could see the sure, graceful lines of her figure; he could see her face, mobile, intelligent, with possibilities that would have made it interesting, even compelling, but for the expression of sullen discontent that masked it. So real, so material did she seem, that it seemed to Jim he could stretch out his hand and touch her. Then she was gone.
Jim’s teeth clicked together, and his good, square-cornered jaw set.