"The voters of this town will attend to that. I was tellin' him the straight truth. If he don't get it passed to him hot off the bat when he tackles 'em, then I'm a sucker. You needn't worry, marm. He'll have plenty of time to 'tend to his garden sass this summer."
It was midnight when Cap'n Sproul returned to an anxious and waiting wife. He was flushed and hot and hoarse, but the gleam in his eye was no longer that of offended pride and ireful resolve. There was triumph in his glance.
"If there's a bunch of yaller dogs think they can put me out of office in this town they'll find they're tryin' to gnaw the wrong bone," he declared hotly.
"But you had told them you wouldn't take the office—you insisted that you were going to resign—you said—"
"It didn't make any diff'runce what I said—when I said it things was headed into the wind and all sails was drawin' and I was on my course. But you let some one try to plunk acrost my bows when I'm on the starboard tack, and have got right of way, well, more or less tophamper is goin' to be carried away—and it won't be mine."
"What have you done, Aaron?" she inquired with timorous solicitude.
"Canvassed this town from one end to the other and by moral suasion, the riot act, and a few other things I've got pledges from three-quarters of the voters that when I pass in my resignation to-morrow they'll vote that they won't accept it and will ask me to keep on in office for the good of Smyrna. This town won't get a chance to yoke me up with your brother Gid and point us out as a steer team named 'Down and Out!' He's 'Down' but I ain't 'Out' yet, not by a dam—excuse me, Louada Murilla! But I've been mixin' into politics and talkin' political talk."
"And I had so hoped you were out of it," she sighed, as she followed him to their repose.
She watched him make ready and depart for town hall the next morning without comment, but the wistful look in her eyes spoke volumes. Cap'n Sproul was silent with the air of a man with big events fronting him.
She watched the teams jog along the highway toward the village. She saw them returning in dusty procession later in the forenoon—signal that the meeting was over and the voters were returning to their homes.