Page:Despotism and democracy; a study in Washington society and politics (IA despotismdemocra00seawiala).pdf/231

 books—which, unlike Mr. James Brentwood Baldwin, he read diligently, and never thought to mention that he lived among them—Thorndyke spent his placid summers. He read much, and observed a great deal. He was close to the border of Crane's State, and their congressional districts were contiguous, and naturally Thorndyke knew the political happenings across the border.

In all his experience of men, Thorndyke had never watched with the same interest the development of a man in his public and private life as he watched Julian Crane's. He saw the good and the evil struggling together in Crane, and had not yet found out which was fundamental.

Crane, with Annette and the two children, had returned to Circleville immediately after the adjournment of Congress, and immediately, on reaching home, he had been beset with a temptation, against which he had made a short, hard fight, and then was conquered, and gave up all the honesty of his soul as regards politics. One week after his return to Circleville, he had received overtures for peace from Governor Sanders, and a meeting between them had been arranged.