Cowperwood pondered over this.  If he could handle a fraction of this great loan now—­he could not possibly handle the whole of it, for he had not the necessary connections—­he could add considerably to his reputation as a broker while making a tidy sum.  How much could he handle?  That was the question.  Who would take portions of it?  His father’s bank?  Probably.  Waterman & Co.?  A little.  Judge Kitchen?  A small fraction.  The Mills-David Company?  Yes.  He thought of different individuals and concerns who, for one reason and another—­personal friendship, good-nature, gratitude for past favors, and so on—­would take a percentage of the seven-percent. bonds through him.  He totaled up his possibilities, and discovered that in all likelihood, with a little preliminary missionary work, he could dispose of one million dollars if personal influence, through local political figures, could bring this much of the loan his way.

One man in particular had grown strong in his estimation as having some subtle political connection not visible on the surface, and this was Edward Malia Butler.  Butler was a contractor, undertaking the construction of sewers, water-mains, foundations for buildings, street-paving, and the like.  In the early days, long before Cowperwood had known him, he had been a garbage-contractor on his own account.  The city at that time had no extended street-cleaning service, particularly in its outlying sections and some of the older, poorer regions.  Edward Butler, then a poor young Irishman, had begun by collecting and hauling away the garbage free of charge, and feeding it to his pigs and cattle.  Later he discovered that some people were willing to pay a small charge for this service.  Then a local political character, a councilman friend of his—­they were both Catholics—­saw a new point in the whole thing.  Butler could be made official garbage-collector.  The council could vote an annual appropriation for this service.  Butler could employ more wagons than he did now—­dozens of them, scores.  Not only that, but no other garbage-collector would be allowed.  There were others, but the official contract awarded him would also, officially, be the end of the life of any and every disturbing rival.  A certain amount of the profitable proceeds would have to be set aside to assuage the feelings of those who were not contractors.  Funds would have to be loaned at election time to certain individuals and organizations—­but no matter.  The amount would be small.  So Butler and Patrick Gavin Comiskey, the councilman (the latter silently) entered into business relations.  Butler gave up driving a wagon himself.  He hired a young man, a smart Irish boy of his neighborhood, Jimmy Sheehan, to be his assistant, superintendent, stableman, bookkeeper, and what not.  Since he soon began to make between four and five thousand a year, where before he made two thousand, he moved into a brick house in an outlying section of the south side, and sent his children to school.  Mrs. Butler gave up making soap and feeding pigs.  And since then times had been exceedingly good with Edward Butler.