Spinney did not relish the merriment which followed that sally.
"You've outgrown that coat of arms, then, in these days," he retorted. "They all know you by a different stripe since you set the other chap at work, Squire Thornton. And the pendulum of power is swinging the other way! The people are behind me. You'd better get aboard." His style of humor depended most on its effrontery. He held out one of his badges. "Better put it on," he advised. "Get aboard with the rush! They're all for 'Honest Arba.'"
The Duke stepped forward and presented his breast.
"Pin it on, Arba. When a man shifts his business and is introducing a brand-new line of goods, different from what he ever carried before, he needs all the advertising he can get. Pin it on!"
But Mr. Spinney did not pin it on. He had been sure that the old man would indignantly refuse, and his discomfiture was evident.
"You're showing your regular disposition, I see," he growled. "Grabbing everything you can get hold of. But a joke is a joke—let this one rest right here! Thornton, I say it here to your face, where all the boys can hear me: the people want a change in this State. I am not going behind a door to talk with you—that's been done too much! I stand in the open and say it! Open fighting after this—that's my code. I fight for the people. The people shall be put wise and kept wise to all that's going on."
"It's a good plan," counselled the Duke, unperturbed. "I see I can't tell you anything about advertising." He tapped a badge on the breast of a man near him.
"I'm for the people!" shouted Spinney. "The old wagon needs a new wheel-horse. I don't insist I'm the right one—or the only one. I merely say I'm willing to take hold and haul, if the people want me to. I offer myself, if no better one is found."
The crowd applauded that sentiment generously.
Thornton did not lose his amiability—his tolerant yet irritating good-humor.