"How'll you get the Association to give you the money then?" Murphy followed up.
"I can get the emergency fund increased. We have to give no account of that, you know."
"You seem to have thought o' everything, Baxter," Murphy admitted. "I say we can't see Foley any too soon."
Bobbs and Isaacs approved this judgment heartily.
"I'll write him, then, to meet us here to-morrow afternoon. There's one more point now." He paused to hunt for a phrase. "Don't you think the suggestion should—ah—come from him?"
The three men looked puzzled. "My mind don't make the jump," said Murphy.
Baxter coughed. It was not very agreeable, this having to say things right out. "Don't you see? If we make the offer, it's—well, it's bribery. But if we can open the way a little bit, and lead him on to make the demand, why we're——"
"Held up, o' course!" supplied Murphy admiringly.
"Yes. In that case, if the negotiations with Foley come to nothing, or there is a break later, Foley can't make capital out of it, as he might in the first case. We're safe."
"We couldn't help ourselves! We were held up!" Alderman Murphy could not restrain a joyous laugh, and he held out a red hairy hand. "Put 'er there, Baxter! There was a time when I classed you with the rest o' the reform bunch you stand with in politics—fit for nothin' but to wear white kid gloves and to tell people how good you are. But say, you're the smoothest article I've met yet!"