“It’s Maggie Dwyer,” said Jimmie. “Say, there’s a girl for yer life! She’s got ’em all tied hand an’ foot.”
“If there was no Annie,” remarked Goose, “and I had the drag with Maggie that youse have, why her name’d be McGonagle in short order, le’me tell ye that.”
“G’way,” said Larry. “Quit yer stringin’.”
“This is on the level,” insisted McGonagle. “I’ve heard it talked about for years. Everybody in the ward knowed that she wanted ye,—everybody but yerself. But, say, youse seemed so dead leary about the t’ing that nobody had the nerve to say anyt’ing to youse.”
After the two young men departed, a perfect stream of reporters began to call, all anxious to get Larry’s views upon the political situation; and when this had subsided, Mason and Kerrigan came in, to talk over yesterday and confer about to-morrow.
“Did youse see McQuirk since yesterday?” asked Larry, after some time spent in this fashion.
“No,” answered Kerrigan, “but I received a note from him late last night, asking me to call upon him this afternoon.”
Larry nodded. “I was at his house when he wrote it,” said he. “Youse don’t need to worry any about him; he’s right in line. He kin carry the ward, with youse on the ticket, hands down. And that’s McQuirk’s game, every time. As long as he’s on the side that wins he can make good, ye know, and any time they need the ward in a deal they have to come to him with the money.”
“Owen Dwyer seems to think,” said Mason, “that the election is only a matter of the size of Kerrigan’s majority.”
“That’s right,” said Larry. “In this ward, and in all the others for that matter, the fightin’s done at the primaries; the guy what’s named in the regular way by the party what runs the ward, has got the election cinched.”