The Titan [107]
young MacDonald talk if he wants to. If he says too much you can talk to his father. As for Hyssop, he's an old grandmother anyhow. I've never known him to be for a public improvement yet that was really good for Chicago unless Schryhart or Merrill or Arneel or someone else of that crowd wanted it. I know them of old. My advice is to go ahead and never mind them. To hell with them! Things will be sweet enough, once you are as powerful as they are. They'll get nothing in the future without paying for it. It's little enough they've ever done to further anything that I wanted.
Cowperwood, however, remained cool and thoughtful. Should he pay young MacDonald? he asked himself. Addison knew of no influence that he could bring to bear. Finally, after much thought, he decided to proceed as he had planned. Consequently, the reporters around the City Hall and the council-chamber, who were in touch with Alderman Thomas Dowling, McKenty's leader on the floor of council, and those who called occasionally--quite regularly, in fact--at the offices of the North Chicago Street Railway Company, Cowperwood's comfortable new offices in the North Side, were now given to understand that two ordinances--one granting the free use of the La Salle Street tunnel for an unlimited period (practically a gift of it), and another granting a right of way in La Salle, Munroe, Dearborn, and Randolph streets for the proposed loop--would be introduced in council very shortly. Cowperwood granted a very flowery interview, in which he explained quite enthusiastically all that the North Chicago company was doing and proposed to do, and made clear what a splendid development it would assure to the North Side and to the business center.
At once Schryhart, Merrill, and some individuals connected with the Chicago West Division Company, began to complain in the newspaper offices and at the clubs to Ricketts, Braxton, young MacDonald, and the other editors. Envy of the pyrotechnic progress of the man was as much a factor in this as anything else. It did not make the slightest difference, as Cowperwood had sarcastically pointed out, that every other corporation of any significance in Chicago had asked and received without money and without price. Somehow his career in connection with Chicago gas, his venturesome, if unsuccessful effort to enter Chicago society, his self-acknowledged Philadelphia record, rendered the sensitive cohorts of the ultra-conservative exceedingly fearful. In Schryhart's Chronicle appeared a news column which was headed, "Plain Grab of City Tunnel Proposed." It was a very truculent statement, and irritated Cowperwood greatly. The Press (Mr. Haguenin's paper), on the other hand, was most cordial to the idea of the loop, while appearing to be a little uncertain as to whether the tunnel should be granted without compensation or not. Editor Hyssop felt called upon to insist that something more than merely nominal compensation should be made for the tunnel, and that "riders" should be inserted in the loop ordinance making it incumbent upon the North Chicago company to keep those thoroughfares in full repair and well lighted. The Inquirer, under Mr. MacDonald, junior, and Mr. Du Bois, was in rumbling opposition. No free tunnels, it cried; no free ordinances for privileges in the down-town heart. It had nothing to say about Cowperwood personally. The Globe, Mr. Braxton's paper, was certain that no free rights to the tunnel should be given, and that a much better route for the loop could be found--one larger and more serviceable to the public, one that might be made to include State Street or Wabash Avenue, or both, where Mr. Merrill's store was located. So it went, and one could see quite clearly to what extent the interests of the public figured in the majority of these particular viewpoints.
Cowperwood, individual, reliant, utterly indifferent to opposition of any kind, was somewhat angered by the manner in which his overtures had been received, but still felt that the best way out of his troubles was to follow McKenty's
Cowperwood, however, remained cool and thoughtful. Should he pay young MacDonald? he asked himself. Addison knew of no influence that he could bring to bear. Finally, after much thought, he decided to proceed as he had planned. Consequently, the reporters around the City Hall and the council-chamber, who were in touch with Alderman Thomas Dowling, McKenty's leader on the floor of council, and those who called occasionally--quite regularly, in fact--at the offices of the North Chicago Street Railway Company, Cowperwood's comfortable new offices in the North Side, were now given to understand that two ordinances--one granting the free use of the La Salle Street tunnel for an unlimited period (practically a gift of it), and another granting a right of way in La Salle, Munroe, Dearborn, and Randolph streets for the proposed loop--would be introduced in council very shortly. Cowperwood granted a very flowery interview, in which he explained quite enthusiastically all that the North Chicago company was doing and proposed to do, and made clear what a splendid development it would assure to the North Side and to the business center.
At once Schryhart, Merrill, and some individuals connected with the Chicago West Division Company, began to complain in the newspaper offices and at the clubs to Ricketts, Braxton, young MacDonald, and the other editors. Envy of the pyrotechnic progress of the man was as much a factor in this as anything else. It did not make the slightest difference, as Cowperwood had sarcastically pointed out, that every other corporation of any significance in Chicago had asked and received without money and without price. Somehow his career in connection with Chicago gas, his venturesome, if unsuccessful effort to enter Chicago society, his self-acknowledged Philadelphia record, rendered the sensitive cohorts of the ultra-conservative exceedingly fearful. In Schryhart's Chronicle appeared a news column which was headed, "Plain Grab of City Tunnel Proposed." It was a very truculent statement, and irritated Cowperwood greatly. The Press (Mr. Haguenin's paper), on the other hand, was most cordial to the idea of the loop, while appearing to be a little uncertain as to whether the tunnel should be granted without compensation or not. Editor Hyssop felt called upon to insist that something more than merely nominal compensation should be made for the tunnel, and that "riders" should be inserted in the loop ordinance making it incumbent upon the North Chicago company to keep those thoroughfares in full repair and well lighted. The Inquirer, under Mr. MacDonald, junior, and Mr. Du Bois, was in rumbling opposition. No free tunnels, it cried; no free ordinances for privileges in the down-town heart. It had nothing to say about Cowperwood personally. The Globe, Mr. Braxton's paper, was certain that no free rights to the tunnel should be given, and that a much better route for the loop could be found--one larger and more serviceable to the public, one that might be made to include State Street or Wabash Avenue, or both, where Mr. Merrill's store was located. So it went, and one could see quite clearly to what extent the interests of the public figured in the majority of these particular viewpoints.
Cowperwood, individual, reliant, utterly indifferent to opposition of any kind, was somewhat angered by the manner in which his overtures had been received, but still felt that the best way out of his troubles was to follow McKenty's