"Not till I've beaten the face off Fleckenstein," said Henderson, softly.
"I want to get in touch with Mrs. Pen," said Oscar Ames.
"Aw, forget it, Ames!" said Murphy. "I don't doubt she's a smart girl, but this is no suffragette meeting."
"Don't try to start anything," said Oscar. "Wait till you're married for thirty years like me and maybe you'll have learned a thing or two."
"Don't quarrel, boys," said Uncle Denny. "Me heart is like lead within me. How can I think of Jim as anywhere but with the Service?"
"If he goes, I go," said Henderson. "The only reason I stayed up on the Makon was because of him. What's the matter with the wooden heads in this country? I'd like to be fool killer for a year."
Murphy was chewing his cigar. "You'd have to commit suicide if you was," he said. "I've tried everything against Fleckenstein except the one way to swing votes in America and that's with whiskey or dollars. Under the circumstance we can't use either. I'm going to turn in. I'm at the end of my rope."
Henderson followed Murphy to the door. Oscar Ames forgot to lower his voice. He squared his big shoulders and shouted: "You blame quitters! I ain't ashamed to ask women for ideas if you are. The women got me into this fight and I'll bet they get me out."
He nodded belligerently at Uncle Denny and strode out into the night. Uncle Denny, left alone in the living room, stood long on the hearthrug, talking to himself and now and again shaking his head despondently.
"I mind how after he found himself, he was always making trails in front of the old fireplace in the brownstone front. I mind how he first heard of the Reclamation Service. 'How'd you like that, Uncle Denny,' he said, 'James Manning, U.S.R.S.' What'll he do now, poor lad?