He refused it!" "Refused it," gasped Mr.Spillikins, "I say!" Conversations such as this filled up the leisure and divided the business time of all the best people in the city.
In the general gloomy outlook, however, one bright spot was observable.
The "wave" had evidently come just at the opportune moment.

For not only were civic elections pending but just at this juncture four or five questions of supreme importance would be settled by the incoming council.

There was, for instance, the question of the expropriation of the Traction Company (a matter involving many millions); there was the decision as to the renewal of the franchise of the Citizens' Light Company--a vital question; there was also the four hundred thousand dollar purchase of land for the new addition to the cemetery, a matter that must be settled.

And it was felt, especially on Plutoria Avenue, to be a splendid thing that the city was waking up, in the moral sense, at the very time when these things were under discussion.

All the shareholders of the Traction Company and the Citizens' Light--and they included the very best, the most high-minded, people in the city--felt that what was needed now was a great moral effort, to enable them to lift the city up and carry it with them, or, if not all of it, at any rate as much of it as they could.
"It's a splendid movement!" said Mr.Fyshe (he was a leading shareholder and director of the Citizens' Light), "what a splendid thing to think that we shan't have to deal for our new franchise with a set of corrupt rapscallions like these present aldermen.