“After all, I’m not going to drop out of that street-car deal. I’m going back to fight it.”
“Fight it?” The old man looked bewildered. “For whom?”
“For the people.”
“For the people!”
Amazement, contempt, rising wrath, struggled in his face. “You realize, young man, that means you are going to fight me?”
“Forgive me, uncle, for I think we have truly loved one another—”
“No snuffling!”
“Yes, I am going to fight you.”
The old man stared as if he could not quite believe his ears; but the square-chinned, determined young face left him no doubt. His lips tightened into a hard straight line, his head sank crouching between his shoulders, his short hair seemed to rise like the ruff of an angry dog. He leaned forward—the fighting John Howard that many a man in Chicago had met and gone down before.
“A declaration of war, eh?” he said in a slow guttural voice. “All right. I thought I was done for, but that puts ten more good years in me. And I think John Howard can give you all you want. Oh, it’ll be a fight, young man, a fight—and you’ll never imagine it’s anything else! And now, good-morning to you.”