"Jack, I suppose I forgot a good many things I should have remembered, first and foremost that I did not wish you made conspicuous and that I was older than I used to be, and that I ought by this time to have learned to control my temper."
"Yes, but Billy Preston declares that when he arrived you seemed to have half a dozen persons against you and that you were managing pretty well. It was disgraceful of you, Jim; you who have been preaching for as many years as I can remember that there was to be no fighting on the Rainbow ranch for any cause whatsoever and that no excuse would be accepted by you as a justifiable one. What influence do you suppose your sermons will now have among the cowboys? As for making me conspicuous, it seems rather a funny thing that neither you nor I recognized that running for a public office is apt to make one conspicuous. One can hardly vote for a person one has never heard of."
Jim sighed.
"Yes, you are right, Jack, but it is too late now to discuss this side of the situation. If you are elected it won't be any better; sure to be worse, in fact. I suppose you realize that if you live in Washington the greater part of the year, you'll have to bear with my society most of the time."
Jacqueline Kent bit her lip for an instant and then shook her head.
"Good of you to suggest it, Jim, but out of the question of course. Jimmie and I'll have to manage somehow, trusting members of the family will visit us now and then to see how we are getting on. But as for you, you are too much needed here at the ranch, besides having to look after the new little ranch girls. I could never accept the sacrifice."
"Yes? But I don't see how you are going to prevent it, Jack," Jim answered abruptly and in a tone Jack had never contradicted in her life. Always Jim Colter had been the one person whose will was stronger than her own, even in the important matters in which she always felt she had the better right to judge.
"Oh, well, we won't quarrel on the subject yet, Jim, because of course there are ninety-nine chances to one that I won't be elected. I must go now and dress for dinner. Here comes Professor Russell to sit with you. I'll come back later if I hear the returns to-night."
A little after eight o'clock on this same evening, a group of Jacqueline Kent's friends, her own family, and Jacqueline herself, were standing talking together in the drawing-room of the big house; occasionally one or two of them disappeared to come back with the latest news of the election returns.
Earlier in the afternoon the reports from the neighborhood districts had given a majority to the feminine candidate. Later, when the counting began to take place in the cities, there appeared a change in the results, with Peter Stevens leading. Then Jacqueline Kent's victory seemed assured by a sudden spurt in the figures giving her an important lead throughout the western portion of the state.