"Tastes like another," whispered Slade, and proceeded to fill up the glasses again. Micky drank without further protest. The pleasant glow at his stomach infused itself into his veins, mounted benignly toward his brain. Always abnormally quick to respond to the spur of stimulants, he was conscious almost instantly of added zest for the adventure.
"Come on and be mighty quiet," murmured Slade, and the pair made their way on tiptoe toward the office. Slade approached the door, the upper part of which enclosed a wide glass, behind which hung a screening yellow shade. There was a narrow space below it, however, through which a view of the interior could be obtained, the shade being a little too short to quite reach the length of the glass. Through an open transom overhead the speech of those inside was clearly audible.
The eavesdroppers bent, looking into the office. Shaughnessy sat in his big leather chair, indolently puffing a black cigar, dreamily gazing toward the ceiling. Near him, in an attitude of deep dejection, sat Judge Boynton. The venerable candidate was speaking, while the boss might have been a thousand miles away. But the watchers knew that the jurist had the honor of his chief's undivided attention. It was a secret of Shaughnessy's success, the veil of icy indifference that hid so potently the dark workings of his own mind while he probed unerringly into the recesses of others.
"Why did you drag me in again?" the Judge was inquiring. "Were there not others; less tired, more calloused? For I was never calloused. You got your talons into me by a trick!" He clenched impotent hands. "I did—as I had to—for years, and, when the time came, I went thankfully enough into retirement. I thought I had done with you forever. And now—isn't the memory of the past enough without such a future as you have marked out for me—far worse than the past? It's not to be borne!"
Shaughnessy lowered his eyes. His cold, snaky gaze met the other's fairly. "You talk like an old woman," he sneered. "You sound like a paper-covered novel. I got hold of you by a trick, eh? Now you know how I got you, well enough. I put out bait that always lands supposedly honest men, like yourself, and you swallowed it, hook and all, just like a lot of other respectable suckers before you, and since. Well, what are you kicking about? You put yourself where you had to be useful to me, didn't you? Well, it's paid you, hasn't it? And this little programme we've got mapped out for the next two years, it's going to pay you, and all of us, so we can retire for good." He chuckled insolently.
The old man's lips set in a grim line. "I'm praying that I may be defeated," he said, "but if not, I'll be mayor of this town. I may—"
Shaughnessy straightened in his chair. His mouth grew repellently cruel, his eyes assumed the fixed glare of a serpent about to strike. "Now see here!" He spat out the words like venom. "I'll be elected next week, and I'll be mayor these two years coming. You're a decoy just now, and nothing more; but after the first of January you'll be a live duck, with a string on you, that's all. You must be getting into your second childhood to play the damn fool as you have been playing it ever since this thing started. You can't squeal, you can't afford to. If you ever did, it would be all up with me and a lot of others—but you'd go with us, so help me God! Now just you cast your eye on this bunch of teasers for a minute, and get sensible!" Reaching into a secret compartment of his desk he slapped down a bundle of documents.
The gray discouragement crept back into the old man's face. Shaughnessy smiled cruelly. Outside the office O'Byrn eagerly clutched Slade's arm. "We've got to have them!" he breathed in the tout's ear. "After they go," returned Slade.
The next moment brought dismay to the watchers. "I think I'll deposit these elsewhere," observed Shaughnessy casually, with a glance toward the badgered Judge. "I don't think they're safe here." He slipped them into an inner pocket of his coat.
Micky's blank stare of dismay was instantly succeeded by a sudden inspiration, a plan daring but desperate. He plucked at Slade's sleeve, drawing him away from the window. "He mustn't leave here with 'em," he whispered, and proceeded briefly to unfold his plan. Slade, who was of kin with O'Byrn in recklessness, was enthusiastic.