A day later his messenger brought a mass of data back from the State House along with a story about insolent clerks and surly heads of departments who offered all manner of slights and did all they dared to hinder investigation.
“It's a pretty tough condition of affairs, Mr. Converse,” complained the clerk, “when a state's hired servants treat citizens as if they were trespassers in the Capitol. It has got so that our State House isn't much of anything except a branch office for Colonel Dodd.”
“But you told them from what office you came—from my office?”
“Of course I did, sir.”
“Well, what did they say?”
The clerk's face grew red and betrayed sudden embarrassment.
“Oh, they—they—didn't say anything special: just uppish—only—”
“What did they say?” roared Mr. Converse. “You've got a memory! Out with it! Exact words.”
Clerks were taught to obey orders in that office.
“They said,” choked the man, “that simply because your father was governor of this state once you needn't think you could tell folks in the State House to stand around! They said you didn't cut any ice in politics.”