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There he placed a friendly hand on McKenty's arm, an act of familiarity which the politician rather liked. "You felt pretty well satisfied with the way that gas business came out last year, didn't you?" he inquired. "I did," replied McKenty, warmly. "Never more so. I told you that at the time."
"And how about the first, Kerrigan?" inquired Ungerich, a thin, reflective German-American of shrewd presence. Ungerich was one who had hitherto wormed himself higher in McKenty's favor than either Kerrigan or Tiernan. "Oh, the first's all right," replied Kerrigan, archly. "Of course you never can tell. This fellow Scully may do something, but I don't think it will be much.
"What's in it for him? Is he after McKenty's job?" One night the doctor came in from a horseback trip to a tie camp twelve miles up the valley, wearied and soaked with the wet snow that had been falling heavily all day. "Mexico" received him with a wrathful affection. "What the ah what makes you go out a night like this?"
In good tweed and fine linen they frequently conferred in the offices of the Chicago Trust Company, the president's office of the North Chicago Street Railway System, and Mr. Cowperwood's library. No dark scenes were ever enacted there. But just the same, when the time came, the Schryhart-Simms-MacDonald editorial combination did not win. Mr. McKenty's party had the votes.
They went into a long, intimate discussion as to how the forthcoming stock should be divided, how it was to be held in escrow by a favorite bank of Mr. McKenty's until the terms of the agreement under the eventual affiliation with the old companies or the new union company should be fulfilled, and details of that sort.
When Cowperwood next came to McKenty's house the latter was in a receptive frame of mind. "Well," he said, after a few genial preliminary remarks, "I've been learning what's going on. Your proposition is fair enough. Organize your company, and arrange your plan conditionally. Then introduce your ordinance, and we'll see what can be done."
McKenty, being a little dubious of the outcome, had a rocking-chair brought into the council-chamber itself during the hours when the ordinances were up for consideration. In this he sat, presumably as a curious spectator, actually as a master dictating the course of liquidation in hand. Neither Cowperwood nor any one else knew of McKenty's action until too late to interfere with it.
Cowperwood, individual, reliant, utterly indifferent to opposition of any kind, was somewhat angered by the manner in which his overtures had been received, but still felt that the best way out of his troubles was to follow McKenty's advice and get power first.
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