VINTAGE MYSTERIES - 70+ Stories in One Volume (Thriller Classics Series). Robert Barr

within human recollection the newspapers were unanimous in commending the conduct of the head of the State, the organs of the governor's own party lavishly praising him; the opposition sheets grudgingly admitting that he had more backbone than they had given him credit for. Public opinion, like the cat of the simile, had jumped, and that unmistakably.

      "In the name of all that's wonderful, sheriff," said the bewildered governor, "who signed all those petitions? If the papers wanted the man hanged, why, in the fiend's name, did they not say so before, and save me all this worry? Now how many know of this suppressed dispatch?"

      "Well, there's you and your subordinates here and——"

      "We'll say nothing about it."

      "And then there is me and Bowen in Brentingville. That's all."

      "Well, Bowen will keep quiet for his own sake, and you won't mention it."

      "Certainly not."

      "Then let's all keep quiet. The thing's safe if some of those newspaper fellows don't get after it. It's not on record in the books, and I'll burn all the documents."

      And thus it was. Public opinion was once more vindicated. The governor was triumphantly re-elected as a man with some stamina about him.