Culver looked with secret admiration from one man to the other, and continued to think of them and to admire, after they had gone. He felt important, sitting in and by proxy directing the councils of these powerful men, these holders and manipulators of the secret strings whereto were attached puppet peoples and puppet politicians. Seven years behind the scenes with Dumont's most private affairs had given him a thoroughgoing contempt for the mass of mankind. Did he not sit beside the master, at the innermost wheels, deep at the very heart of the intricate mechanism? Did not that position make him a sort of master, at any rate far superior to the princeliest puppet?
At five the next afternoon—the afternoon of the day before the convention—he was at the Eyrie, and sent a servant to say to Mrs. Dumont that he would like to see her. She came down to him in the library.
"I'm only troubling you for a moment," he said.
"I'll relieve you of my package."
"Very well," said Pauline. "I haven't thought of it since day before yesterday. I'll bring it down to you."
She left him in the library and went up the stairs—she had been reading everything that was published about the coming convention, and the evident surprise of all the politicians at the strength Scarborough was mustering for ex-Governor Bowen had put her in high good humor. She cautioned herself that he could not carry the convention; but his showing was a moral victory—and what a superb personal triumph! With everything against him—money and the machine and the skilful confusing of the issues by his crafty opponents—he had rallied about him almost all that was really intelligent in his party; and he had demonstrated that he had on his side a mass of the voters large out of all proportion to the number of delegates he had wrested away from the machine—nearly three hundred, when everybody had supposed the machine would retain all but a handful.
Money! Her lips curled scornfully—out here, in her own home, among these simple people, the brutal power of money was master just as in New York, among a people crazed by the passion for luxury and display.
She was kneeling before the safe, was working the combination, paper in hand. The knob clicked as the rings fell into place; she turned the bolt and swung the door open. She reached into the safe. Suddenly she drew her hand back and sat up on the floor, looking at the package. "Why, it's for use in the convention!" she exclaimed.
She did not move for several minutes; when she did, it was to examine the time lock, to reset it, to close the door and bolt it and throw the lock off the combination. Then she rose and slowly descended to the library. As she reappeared, empty-handed, Culver started violently and scrutinized her face. Its expression put him in a panic. "Mrs. Dumont!" he exclaimed wildly.
"Has it been stolen?"