Evening star., 1922-11-05

he fought him In the paper. and he
fought him in his home state. II he
had been q prominent man in the
public eye before. you can judge how
much he was in it now. 1t was dull
day that there wasn't a Gordon Of re-
porters sitting In the back parlor and
crowding my typewriting machine.
and Cyrus and me in the middle OF
it, giving out stuff at the rate Of a
mile a minute.
He had some unexpected assistance,
too. Another representative from his
own state developed a little backbone
and gave Cyrus moral support and
some real aid locally back home, and
both were more than welcome.
Moreover. the plain people, the
farmers and miners and people who
live in the little bare towns, who knew
all about the folks in the .U1nand
Hills district. began ITO get their
dander riz." They rallied to Hooper.
Some of the little country papers in
his state came out boldly against
Ryerson. Then one of tho papers in
the state capital published an ed
itorial called "The Handwriting on
downfall Of Ryerson and the rise Of
Cyrus Hooper as the big political
power Of the state. 1t made q sensa-
ton, that editorial, and was copied all
over the state, with bitter comments
by tho Ryerson press and Joyful ones
by the Hooper faction. Then one Of
the Washington papers Investigated
tho Ulnand district and sent on some
sob stun. with photographs, about the
poor, horny-handed settlers, with
their gaunt, pathetic wives and little
children. who would soon be forced.
because Of the greed and rapacity Of
Ryerson. into losing their homes
their ALL Ono Of the New York week
lies took it up, with a special story
or two, tears and righteous indigna-
ton oozing in every paragraph.
OF course, tho real brunt Of, the
thing fell on Cy. And he was per-
fectly magnificent-a regular ber-
serker. He wasn't on the defensive
for a moment-no trench warfare for
him. No, he took a grenade in each
hand. stuck his pistols in his belt,
and with q bowie knife between his
teeth, he was hot-foot after the
enemy every minute. It was beau
tifuL
Yes, It was beautiful-but; It eidn't
get 80 very far. Cyrus was q new
man; Ryerson was one Of the old
guard, and had affiliations every
where. Many . man who would have
been glad to vote with Hooper was
warned by interests in his own state
not to interfere with. Ryerson.' The
situation finally resolved itself into a
deadlock. Ryerson had pulled every
wire he knew. and he had good line
up. Hooper felt pretty certain that
tho greater part Of the minority party
would stand by him. If for no. other
reason than to harass and annoy the
majority. And. of course. he had
friends in the majority party. But did
he have enough7 There was still that
fatal doubt. But It. was going to be
far too close q vote for Ryerson's
comfort, and the ono thing We were
sure of was that Ryerson himself
was bitterly uneasy. He had come
on to Washington to direct his cam
paign in person. He was spending
money like water. He was throwlns
every ounce Of his influence into the
scales. He was probably counting
noses and checking. lists as desper-
ately and as doubtfully as we were
Yet that was cold comfort for the
bill would reach its place on the cal
endar on. Thursday. and-we had. come