As soon as they were alone Farley walked toward Douglas Briggs. “This is a good chance for me to ask you something, sir,” he said.
Briggs smiled. “Have a cigar first, won’t you? Oh, I forgot. I promised Mrs. Briggs there should be no smoking here. We might go out on the balcony or up to the smoking-room.”
Farley shook his head. “Thanks; no. I won’t smoke just now. And I won’t detain you more than a minute.” He hesitated. “What I’m going to ask seems a little like a violation of hospitality,” he remarked, with a look of embarrassment.
“My dear fellow, there’s no such thing as a violation of hospitality in the case of a man in public life,” said Briggs, pleasantly.
“Well, it’s simply this: We want to deny the story about you that’s going all over Washington. It hasn’t got into the papers yet, but I happen to know that the New York Chronicle has it, and is thinking of publishing it.”
Briggs looked grave. In repose his face took on years; the lines around the mouth deepened, and the eyes grew tired and dull. “What story?”
“Why, the story that you are in that Transcontinental Railway deal.”
“Oh, that!” Briggs threw back his head and laughed, but with a suggestion of bitterness. “Why, to my certain knowledge, they’ve been saying that about me for the past five years—ever since I entered Congress. In fact, there’s hardly been a big political steal that I haven’t been in.”
“But the Chronicle people are pretty strong, you know,” Farley insisted.
“I don’t give a snap of my finger for them.”