“And you’re pretty sure they can swing the organization when the caucus is called?” demanded the Duke.

“Two to one—­and our men ain’t got a smell on that check-list they’ve doctored.  Why, they’ve even got me marked ‘Socialist.’  You can imagine what they’ve done to the rest of the boys.  It’s one o’clock now.” (He had looked at four watches, one after the other, a part of his dickerer’s stock-in-trade.) “In an hour and fifteen minutes they’ll be organized and votin’ by check-list.  I ain’t a man to give up easy, Squire, but I swear it looks as though they had us headed so far on the homestretch that we ain’t near enough to trip ’em or bust a sulky wheel on ’em.”

“You’ve got more than an hour’s leeway.”  It was a soft lisp of sound that startled the group.  The man had come by devious ways through the gullies of the Thornton field, around the corner of “The Barracks,” and upon the porch.  Those who knew him declared that “Whispering Urban” Cobb never walked by the straight way when there was a crooked one by which he could dodge around.

“No, they can’t get a-goin’ at no two o’clock,” he assured them.  A drooping gray mustache curtained his mouth, drooping gray eyebrows shaded his eyes, and he crowded very close to them and whispered, “I’ve stole the call for the caucus, and they’ll hunt for it about half an hour, and then they’ll have to round the committee up and get ’em to sign another, and have constables swear that the other call was posted—­and, well, they won’t get going much before four.”

The Duke looked at him indulgently.

“I took it on myself to do it.  I reckoned you might need the extra time, seein’ that they was tryin’ to spring a trap on you.”

He took the cigar that the Duke offered him in lieu of praise.

“Bein’ sure of that much time—­if you’ll see to it that they’re regular about the call!” Mr. Cobb cocked inquiring eye at the old man.

“I’ll see to it,” stated Thornton, grimly.

“Well, then, bein’ sure of that time, I’ll—­Mr. Thornton, would you object if I was to start in this afternoon on the contract of clearing up that slash where you operated on Jo Quacca last winter?  Of course, this ain’t just the best kind of weather for bonfires, but—­the fire will certainly burn!” His whispering voice gave the suggestion ominous significance.

The Hon. Thelismer Thornton stared for a moment at Cobb, and then looked up at the heights that shimmered in the beating sun.

“You may start in, Cobb,” he said at last.  His perception of what the man meant came instantly.  He had hesitated while he figured chances.  “Take fifty of those men out behind there,” his thumb jerked over his shoulder.  “Give every man a shovel, and see that it doesn’t get away from you.  More smoke than fire, see!”

Mr. Cobb hastened away.

The duller comprehension of the chairman of the State Committee had not grasped the significance of the conversation.