The money requisite¹ for the construction of elevated roads having been thus pyrotechnically obtained, the acquisition of franchises³ remained no easy matter. It involved, among other problems, the taming of Chaffee Thayer Sluss, who, quite unconscious of the evidence stored up against him, had begun to fulminate the moment it was suggested in various secret political quarters that a new ordinance⁴ was about to be introduced, and that Cowperwood was to be the beneficiary. “Don’t you let them do that, Mr. Sluss,” observed Mr. Hand, who for purposes of conference had courteously⁵ but firmly bidden his hireling, the mayor, to lunch. “Don’t you let them pass that if you can help it.” (As chairman or president of the city council Mr. Sluss held considerable manipulative power over the machinery⁷ of procedure.) “Raise such a row that they won’t try to pass it over your head. Your political future really depends on it—your standing⁸ with the people of Chicago. The newspapers and the respectable financial and social elements will fully⁹ support you in this. Otherwise they will wholly desert you. Things have come to a handsome pass when men sworn and elected to perform given services turn on their backers and betray them in this way!”