“I had eleven votes pledged and only got ten. Some lowlife went back on me!”
“You had eleven—” A light broke on Clif. “Why—why,” he sputtered at last, “you blamed old fox! Do you mean to say that you knew all the time—”
“Well, I couldn’t be sure,” Tom chuckled. “As it was, one of my pledges got away. But I sort of expected, Clif.”
“You—you politician! How’d you do it?”
“Just got them to promise to vote for me in case my name was proposed. They didn’t think it would be, of course.”
“I should say not! But how did—how’d it happen that Henning nominated you?”
“Henning thought I was the right fellow for the job,” replied Tom tranquilly.
“He did, eh? I’d like to know where he got that—”
“Some one told him, I guess.”