Page:Upbuilders by Lincoln Steffens.djvu/110



L. Record in Jersey. He is the man who came to Mark Fagan when the kindly Mayor of Jersey City was at the first crisis of his administration, and Record helped Mark Fagan. From suspecting him, Mayor Mark came to lean upon him for his economic policy, and they and their Jersey City cabinet have influenced Jersey politics and the Jersey legislature more and more healthfully than any other one force in the state. Yet, while none denies the perfect honesty of Mark Fagan, many men distrust George L. Record. And you may recall that Colby, two years before, when he took to Fagan, “disliked” Record. But when “Record came,” he told Colby just what to do and how to do it. Colby is very handsome in his acknowledgment of the service Record rendered them in Essex, and his friends confess, though more grudgingly, that Record is a man of resources. But nobody can see what Record gets out of it for Record. They think he wants to go to the United States Senate. I hope he does; this long, lean, thinking Yankee from Jersey City might accomplish something even in the United States Senate. But Record is another story, and it doesn’t matter now “what Record is after.”

When he came to Colby, he came suggesting that since Colby had made one good fight at Trenton, he should make another; and since he