"Damn Boston!" was his succinct reply.
III
As Trent's campaign neared its close, Barbara could tell by the weariness in his voice, over the 'phone, just how near he was to the end of his endurance. It fretted her constantly that she had to stay on in Boston, when she might look after him, make it easier for him if only she could be with him. Twice he came to Boston on flying visits, and the last time she almost decided to throw up her engagement and go back with him.
He assured her that her absence was providential, that he could never see her, even if she were in the same hotel, that it was less tantalizing to have her away, than near and far. He never failed to say good-night by long distance. Sometimes the tired little boy note crept into it to disturb her slumbers.
The week of the election arrived with excitement high. No gubernatorial campaign in years had been fought with such tenacity and fierceness. The entire state was lined up in rabid factions. Trent occasionally sent Barbara a package of newspapers from the smaller towns in the state and she read in one of Paul as "the embodiment of youth and courage, the two qualities most needed in the new governor. Full of enthusiasm for reforms that mean greater efficiency in our state government, yet tempered by a calm judgment and the experience which came to him in his brilliant career in the law." Next she read: "Paul Trent is the tool and mouthpiece of rampant reform. Once in the governor's chair, he will prove a dangerous factor to be dealt with by the people when it is too late."
They accused him of every crime in the decalogue, this side of murder—and every virtue. They mentioned his mysterious marriage with a well-known actress as proof of his loose moral standards—as proof of his fine democratic ideas! The whole thing, viewed as a spectacle, made one of the absurd exhibits of our political system.
When Barbara was not raging, perforce, she laughed.
For the first three days of the week before election the New York call came once at one, twice later than that. Three or four meetings a night listened to Trent, and during the day he addressed crowds in the nearby towns. The day before election, at noon, Barbara entered her manager's office with an air of bravado.
"Oh, good-morning. This is an honour," he smiled.
"Wait a minute before you waste that smile! An understudy has got to go on for me to-night and to-morrow night."