He walked over to the hall mirror and adjusted his tie. He was getting nervous. Stella was keeping him waiting longer than usual. She was doing this to tease him, but he would have his revenge when they were married.
Steve had quickly come to a perfect understanding with the Judge. The Piedmont Congressional District, which included several mountain counties, was overwhelmingly Democratic. The Judge, as the Republican leader, had promised Steve to put up no candidate, but to support him as an independent if the approaching Democratic Convention nominated John Graham for Congress.
Steve as a man of capital proclaimed that the money interests of the North should be cultivated and that a deal with the enemy was always better than a fight.
Sure of his success, he had already promised Stella with boastful certainty a brilliant social season in Washington as his wife. In spite of his immense vanity, he knew that this promise had gone far to win her favour. She too was vain of her beauty, and her social ambitions were boundless. He had received her mild professions of love with a grain of salt. She was yet too young and beautiful to take life seriously. His fortune and his good looks had been the magnets that drew her. But he was content. He would make
