'By Jove, Jennie!' he cried, bringing his fist down on the table when she
had finished; 'you're wasted in the newspaper business; you ought to be a
politician! Say, girl, if you marry me, I'll be President of the United
States yet.'
'Oh no, you wouldn't,' said Jennie, quite unabashed by his handsome, if
excited, proposal. 'No corrupt New York politician will ever be President
of the United States. You have the great honest bulk of the people to
deal with there, and I'm Democrat enough to believe in them when it comes
to big issues, however much you may befog them in small; you can't fool
all people for all time, Mr. Fleming, as a man who was not in little
politics once said. Every now and then the awakened people will get up
and smash you.'
Fleming laughed boisterously.
'That's just it,' he said. 'It's every now and then. If they did it every
year I would have to quit politics. But will you send the particulars of
this meeting to the _Argus_ without giving me away?'
'Yes, I recognise its importance. Now, I want you to give me every
detail--the number of the room they met in, the exact hour, and all that.
What I like to get in a report of a secret meeting is absolute accuracy
in small matters, so that those who were there will know it is not
guesswork. That always takes the backbone out of future denials. I'll
mention your name----'
'Bless my soul, don't do that!'
'I must say you were present.'
'Why?'
'Why? Dear me! you can't be so stupid as not to see that, if your name
is left out, suspicion will at once point to you as the divulger?'
'Yes I suppose that is so.
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