“It is corruption!” cried the baron, who had no idea who Victoria was, and a very slim notion of what Mr. Crewe was talking about.
“Corruption!” said Mr. Crewe. “What can you expect when a railroad owns a State? The other day in Britain, where they elect fourteen delegates, the editor of a weekly newspaper printed false ballots with two of my men at the top and one at the bottom, and eleven railroad men in the middle. Fortunately some person with sense discovered the fraud before it was too late.”
“You don't tell me!” said the baron.
“And every State and federal office-holder has been distributing passes for the last three weeks.”
“Pass?” repeated the baron. “You mean they fight with the fist—so? To distribute a pass—so,” and the baron struck out at an imaginary enemy. “It is the American language. I have read it in the prize-fight. I am told to read the prize-fight and the base-ball game.”
Mr. Crewe thought it obviously useless to continue this conversation.
“The railroad,” said the baron, “he is the modern Machiavelli.”
“I say,” Mr. Rangely, the Englishman, remarked to Victoria, “this is a bit rough on you, you know.”
“Oh, I'm used to it,” she laughed.
“Mr. Crewe,” said Mrs. Pomfret, to the table at large, “deserves tremendous credit for the fight he has made, almost single-handed. Our greatest need in this country is what you have in England, Mr. Rangely,—gentlemen in politics. Our country gentlemen, like Mr. Crewe, are now going to assume their proper duties and responsibilities.” She laid her napkin on the table and glanced at Alice as she continued: “Humphrey, I shall have to appoint you, as usual, the man of the house. Will you take the gentlemen into the library?”