Through One Administration

by Frances Hodgson Burnett

"There," he said, with an experienced air, "there is one of them this moment. It is beginning to be regarded as a fact that he is mixed up with one of the biggest jobs the country has ever known. He is up to his ears in this Westoria business, it's believed, though he professes to be nothing more than a sort of interested looker-on and a friend of the prime movers. He's a gentleman, you see, with a position in society, and a pretty wife, who is a favorite, and the pretty wife entertains his friends; and when a man is in an uncertain frame of mind the husband invites him to dinner, and the pretty wife interests herself in him,—she knows how to do it, they say,—and he goes away a wiser and a better man, and more likely to see his way to making himself agreeable. Nothing professional about it, don't you see? All quite proper and natural. No lobbying about that, you know; but it helps a bill through wonderfully. I tell you there's no knowing what goes on in these tip-top parlors about here."

He said it with modest pride and exultation, and his companions were delighted. They represented the average American, with all his ingenuous eagerness for the dramatic exposure of crime in his fellow-man. They had existed joyously for years in the belief that Washington was the seat of corruption, bribery, and fraud; that it was populated chiefly with brilliant female lobbyists and depraved officials, who carried their privileges to market and bartered and sold them with a guileless candor, whose temerity was only to be equalled by its brazen cheerfulness of spirit. They were, probably, not in the least aware of their mental attitude toward their nation's government; but they revelled in it none the less, and would have felt a keen pang of disappointment if they had been suddenly confronted with the fact that there was actually an element of most unpicturesque honesty in the House and a flavor of shameless impeccability in the Senate. They had heard delightful stories of "jobs" and "schemes," and had hoped to hear more. When they had been taken to the visitors' gallery, they had exhibited an earnest anxiety to be shown the members connected with the last investigation, and had received with private rapture all anecdotes connected with the ruling political scandal. They decided that the country was in a bad way, and felt a glow of honest pride in its standing up at all in its present condition of rottenness. Their ardor had been a little dampened by an incautious statement made by their friend and guide, to the effect that the subject of the investigation seemed likely to clear himself of the charges made against him, and the appearance of Richard Amory, with his personal attractions, his neat equipage, and his air of belonging to the great world, was something of a boon to them. They wished his wife had been with him; they had only seen one female lobbyist as yet, and she had been merely a cheap, flashy woman, with thin, rouged cheeks and sharp, eager eyes.

"Looks rather anxious, doesn't he?" one asked the other, as Amory went by. He certainly looked anxious as he passed them; but once inside the building he made an effort to assume something of his usual air of gay good cheer. It would not do to present himself with other than a fearless front. So he walked with a firm and buoyant tread through the great vaulted corridors and up the marble stairways, exchanging a salutation with one passer-by and a word of greeting with another.

He found Senator Blundel in his committee-room, sitting at the green-covered table, looking over some papers. He was a short, stout man, with a blunt-featured face, grayish hair, which had a tendency to stand on end, and small, shrewd eyes. When he had been in the House, his rising to his feet had generally been the signal for his fellow-members to bestir themselves and turn to listen, as it was his habit to display a sharp humor, of a rough-and-ready sort. Richard had always felt this humor coarse, and, having but little confidence in Blundel's possessing any other qualification for his position, regarded it as rather trying that circumstances should have combined to render his sentiments of such importance in the present crisis. Looking at the thick-set figure and ordinary face he felt that Planefield had been right, and that Bertha might have done much with him, principally because he presented himself as one of the obstacles whose opinions should be formed for them all the more on account of their obstinacy when once biassed in a wrong direction.

But there was no suggestion of these convictions in his manner when he spoke. It was very graceful and ready, and his strong points of good-breeding and mental agility stood him in good stead. The man before him, whose early social advantages had not been great, was not too dull to feel the influence of the first quality, and find himself placed at a secretly acknowledged disadvantage by it. After he had heard his name his small, sharp eyes fixed themselves on his visitor's handsome countenance, with an expression not easy to read.

"It is not necessary for me to make a new statement of our case," said Richard, easily. "I won't fatigue you and occupy your time by repeating what you have already heard stated in the clearest possible manner by Senator Planefield."

Blundel thrust his hands into his pockets and nodded.

"Yes," he responded. "I saw Planefield, and he said a good deal about it."

"Which, of course, you have reflected upon?" said Richard.

"Well, yes. I've thought it over—along with other things."