Loaded Dice

by Ellery H. Clark

Three times in the last week of the campaign, in most unheard-of places and at most unheard-of hours, Gordon met the man whose weak eyes drove him to the wearing of blue goggles and to traveling in the protection of a closed carriage. The conferences were not over-long, and yet they seemed to be regarded as of importance by both of the principals, and after each of them, and especially after the last of the three, Gordon's spirits seemed better, and a certain well-known man about town, who for many years had made a specialty of election bets, in one day not only changed the odds from five to three on Endicott to practically even money, but in addition, even at the altered figures, with the greatest readiness covered everything in sight.

And thus matters went until at length the final night before election was reached. Gordon, in deference to time-honored custom, had reserved the night for a whirlwind tour of the city's twenty-six wards, but when the time arrived it found him for once under a doctor's care—a doctor who did not mix in politics, and who gravely recommended a month's rest, and an instant cessation from all work. Smiling grimly, Gordon left the celebrated practitioner's office, and went home to dose himself with brandy until, on the stroke of seven, gaunt, hollow-cheeked, with dark circles under his eyes, he climbed uncertainly into his place beside Doyle and started on the final effort of the campaign. And somehow, for six solid hours, with the platforms reeling under him, and the red fire dancing drunkenly before his eyes, he managed to get through his evening's task; half mechanically, indeed, and yet, served in good stead by his long practice in speaking and in meeting voters, so well that not one man in a hundred knew they were applauding a candidate who stood on the brink of nervous and physical exhaustion, finishing his battle on sheer nerve alone, game to the core, and ready to fight the people's fight against corruption in high places as long as he could stand or see. From the facts, however, the enterprising Doyle, weighing all the chances, decided that good capital could be made, and, quoting to himself with a grin his favorite phrase, "It has the additional merit of being true," he divulged to the reporters the true state of affairs, with the result that next morning the papers fairly teemed with splendid head-lines. "Gallant Gordon," "A Fighting Candidate," "Democratic Candidate Risks Death in the People's Cause," were some of them, and Doyle felt that for once, at least, the Ideal and the Practical had been effectively united.

And Doyle, indeed, in that last threatening night, came nobly to the front. To Gordon's benumbed brain, at many a critical moment, he furnished the inspiration, and always the inspiration was a happy one. Over in respectable ward ten, Gordon, finishing his plea for righteousness, for decency, for common honesty, had come out into the street to find his motor surrounded by a crowd of street urchins, all anxious in due time to become politicians, and all beginning on solid Democratic principles.

"That's Gordon," they chorused shrilly. "That's the guy." And then, in the jargon of the day, surrounding the automobile, they fairly rent the air with the insistent cry: "Well, what do you say?" "Well, what do you say?" "Can't get elected if you don't scatter the coin." "What do you say?"

The crowd, appreciating the incident to the full, paused. Gordon, not knowing whether he was in ward ten or ward twenty-six, mechanically was on the point of plunging his hand into his capacious, jingling pockets, when Doyle clutched his arm. "For God's sake," he whispered, "don't! Get up and tell the crowd you won't stand for such a thing. Give it to 'em strong."

The suggestion was enough. Gordon nodded, and in an instant was on his feet. "Gentlemen," he said quickly, "I have been telling you that there is something wrong in our state to-day, and when those in authority set the standards they do, what can you expect from the boys who, twenty years from now, will stand in our places? It gives us food for thought to see these boys, the products of our public schools, and yet I think the blame is scarcely theirs. If elected, I pledge myself to see that a course in the simple ethics of right and wrong in respect to our government is included in future in the curriculum of our schools, and for the present, let me say that, rather than give one of these boys a cent of the money for which he asks, without, I believe, fully realizing the enormity of which he is guilty, I will suffer defeat, and suffer it gladly, at the polls to-morrow."

He resumed his seat amid a genuine burst of cheers. "By George," one old conservative was heard to say to a friend, as the motor vanished in a cloud of dust, "that fellow's got the right ring to what he says. He means it, too, every word. I've voted the straight Republican ticket for thirty years, but I'm hanged if I don't give this man a vote tomorrow. I'd like to see what he'll do if he wins."

And so the evening passed. "Something to suit everybody," was Doyle's motto; the reporters were well looked after, and Gordon preached virtue in the tenth, eleventh and the kindred wards, and thence ran down the entire scale, until, out in twenty-six, about two in the morning, he used up the remnants of his voice in a fiery, scathing indictment of the money power—a speech savoring in its radicalism of sheer anarchy. Then, as Doyle got him back into the automobile, outraged nature at last rebelled, and Gordon was got home and to bed in a state bordering on collapse.

A long night's rest, a morning in bed, and the relief of having the strain of the campaign off his mind, all, however, combined to work wonders, and Gordon, choosing to watch the returns from a private office opposite the huge bulletin in front of his own newspaper office, by evening, attended only by Doyle and by his secretary, Field, was able to come down-town in comparatively excellent condition.

The street showed the usual election night scene: the crowds lining the sidewalks in front of the bulletin boards, and overflowing into the street itself; two rival brass bands engaging in a duel of sound; and ever, high above the waiting crowds, the huge lantern throwing the messages upon the glaring white of the screen.