"Wine!" cried Whyland. "You want something different from wine. You want
a good hot whisky----"
"No," said Abner. "No."
The male guests were mostly professional men and representatives of great
corporate interests. They talked together in low undertones about
familiar concerns during their half-hour or so of grace.
"I see you have begun stringing your wires," said one of them to Whyland.
"We are meeting with them all over town."
"Yes, yes," replied Whyland, with the sprightly ingenuousness of a boy.
"Whoever looks for a fair return on his money nowadays must keep a little
in advance of legislation."
"Just what Pence was saying only yesterday."
"I snatched that great truth from my slight association with the Tax
Commission," burbled Whyland. "Almost everything marked, spotted:
property, real and personal; lands, lots, improvements; bonds, stocks,
mortgages----"
"Everything, in short, but franchises?"
"Franchises, yes. Nothing left but to turn one's attention to the public
utilities----"
"And to hope that legislation may lag as far behind and as long behind as
possible."
"Precisely," said Whyland. "Meanwhile, we string our wires----"
"Pence up one pole and you up the next--"
Whyland shrugged his shoulders and laughed. "And may it be long before
they call us down!"
Abner listened to all this in silence, shaking his head sadly and
conscious of a deep and growing depression. Here was Whyland, a clever,
likeable fellow--and his host too--disintegrating before his very eyes.
Whyland looked askant at Abner. "Yes, yes, I know," he almost seemed to
be saying. "But who can tell if a helping hand, extended at the critical
moment, might not have...."