And he was perfectly
sure that some of the big men of an amazed State House lobby might step
into that car along with him and seek to know what in the name o' mischief
had happened overnight to change all the sane and conservative plans in
the way of making a legislature safe!
He bundled himself and his raw pride into his overcoat, turned the fur
collar up around his head, and went down a staircase. He was sneaking and
he knew it and no paltering self-assurance that he was handling a touchy
situation with necessary tact helped his feelings in the least. He stepped
into a taxicab and was glad because the breath of previous passengers that
morning had frosted the windows. That consolation was merely a back-fire
in the rest of the conflagration that raged in him.
It was a dull morning, somber and cold.
When he stamped up the broad walk from the gate of the Corson mansion he
beheld the boarded windows of the ballroom, and the spectacle added to his
sense of chill. But his anger was not cooled.
Senator Corson's secretary was waiting in the hall; he showed the Governor
up to the Senator's study.
Either because the outdoors was not cheerful that morning or because the
Senator had been too much engrossed in meditation to remember that
daylight would serve him, the curtains of the study were drawn and the
electric lamps were on.
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