"What is he after?"
Shelby jerked his head toward the Temple doorstep where Bernard still lingered.
"After her."
CHAPTER VII
"Humor a silk stocking according to his crotchet, that's my maxim," submitted Bowers as they threshed the matter out in its latest aspect.
"I can't see its application to Graves. He's outside politics; hates the very name, they say."
"Practical politics is applied human nature. If a rule is sound in politics, it will work anywhere this side of the pearly gates. Graves may not care a tinker's dam for politics, but evidently he does get queasy when another man's ideas are misappropriated. Perhaps that's his crotchet. Writes himself, doesn't he?"
"Some rubbish or other," returned Shelby, contemptuously.
"That's where he is susceptible, to my thinking. I don't cotton to your woman theory. I say leave women out of politics. So conciliate him; humor his crotchet."
"I can't see why I should kotow to him, or what further harm he can do," said the candidate, but he deferred to Bowers's judgment. "I'll look him up this afternoon," he agreed; "though I've no stomach for the job. I never liked the cuss."