best."

A little later he remarked:

"I wonder if she isn't considerably older than Morrell."




XVI


When he had at last reached downtown after his late breakfast, Keith found
it in a fair turmoil. Knots of men stood everywhere arguing, sometimes very
heatedly. Eureka members were openly expressing their anger over what they
called Taylor's "dirty trick" in putting hirelings on the brakes, men who
did not belong to the Monumental organization at all. If it had not been
for that the Monumentals could never have "sucked" at all. On the other
hand, the Monumentals and their friends were vehemently asserting that they
were well within their rights. Fists were brandished. Several fights
started, but were stopped before they had become serious.

Keith avoided these storm centres, waving a friendly hand, but smilingly
refusing to be drawn in. Near the Merchants' Exchange, however, he came on
a quieter, attentive group, in the centre of which stood Calhoun Bennett.
The Southerner's head was thrown back haughtily, but he was listening with
entire courtesy to a violent harangue from a burly, red-faced man in rough
clothes.

"And I tell you that sort of a trick won't go down with nobody, and the