"And you hold him responsible for his Commander's ambitions?"
The President sprang to his feet and paced the floor a moment, stopped and gazed at her with a look of curious tenderness:
"By jinks, Miss Betty, if I had a few more like you in my Cabinet I wouldn't be so lonesome!"
"Not as you mean it, my child. I'm not going to pretend to you that I don't understand the seriousness of the situation. The Army of the Potomac is behind McClellan to a man. It amounts to infatuation. I sounded his officers. I sounded his men. To-day they are against me and with him. If the issue could be sprung--if the leaders dared to risk their necks on such a revolution, they might win. They don't know this as clearly as I do. Because they are not so well informed they are afraid to move. I have chosen to beat them at their own game----"
"I hate to shatter your ideal, Miss Betty, but I'm afraid there's something of the fox in my make-up after all. Will it shock you to learn this?"
"I shall be greatly relieved to know it," she responded firmly.
"Think, then, for a moment. I suspend McClellan for his failure and replace him with a man I believe to be his superior. The army sullenly resent this change. They do not agree with me. They believe McClellan the greatest General in sight. It's a marvellous thing this power over men which he possesses. It can be used to create a Nation or destroy one. It's a dangerous force. I must handle it with the utmost care. So long as their idol is a martyr the army is unfit for good service. The moment I restore the old commander, in whom both officers and men have unbounded faith, I show them that I am beyond the influence of the political forces which demand his destruction--don't I?"
"And the moment I dare to brave popular disapproval and restore their commander don't you see that I win the confidence of the army in my fairness and my disinterested patriotism?"
"See then what must happen. Now mind you, I would never have restored McClellan to command if I did not know that at this moment he can do the work of putting this disorganized and defeated army into fighting shape better than any other. McClellan thus returned to power must fight. He must win or lose. If he wins I am vindicated and his success is mine. If he loses, he loses his power over the imagination of his men and at last I am master of the situation. I shall back him with every dollar and every man the Nation can send into his next campaign. No matter whether he wins or loses, I _must_ win because the supremacy of the civil power will be restored."