"They've decided about it
now, I imagine," he told his senior, putting on his hat;
and something of the wonted fighting elation came upon
him as he went down the stairs. He was right in his
supposition. They had decided about it, and they were
waiting, in a group that made every effort to look casual,
to tell him when he arrived.
They had delegated what Horace Williams called "the job"
to Mr Farquharson, and he was actually struggling with
the preliminaries of it, when Bingham, uncomfortable
under the curious quietude of the young fellow's attention,
burst out with the whole thing.
"The fact is, Murchison, you can't poll the vote. There's
no man in the Riding we'd be better pleased to send to
the House; but we've got to win this election, and we
can't win it with you."
"You think you can't?" said Lorne.
"You see, old man," Horace Williams put in, "you didn't
get rid of that save-the-Empire-or-die scheme of yours
soon enough. People got to think you meant something by
it."
"I shall never get rid of it," Lorne returned simply,
and the others looked at one another.
"The popular idea seems to be," said Mr Farquharson
judicially, "that you would not hesitate to put Canada
to some material loss, or at least to postpone her
development in various important directions, for the sake
of the imperial connection.
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