o,
incidentally. They're going to close the saloons and dance halls and
make this city sadder than heaven. When they get through, it'll all be
over but the inquest."

"What did Perry do?" I asked.

"Well, he opened the meeting,--made a nice, precise, gentlemanly speech.
Greenhalge and a few young highbrows and a reformed crook named Harrod
did most of the hair-raising. They're going to nominate Greenhalge for
mayor; and he told 'em something about that little matter of the school
board, and said he would talk more later on. If one of the ablest
lawyers in the city hadn't been hired by the respectable crowd and a lot
of other queer work done, the treasurer and purchasing agent would be
doing time. They seemed to be interested, all right."

I turned over some papers on my desk, just to show Ralph that he hadn't
succeeded in disturbing me.

"Who was in the audience? anyone you ever heard of?" I asked.

"Sure thing. Your cousin Robert Breck; and that son-in-law of
his--what's his name? And some other representatives of our oldest
families,--Alec Pound. He's a reformer now, you know. They put him on
the resolutions committee. Sam Ogilvy was there, he'd be classed as
respectably conservative. And one of the Ewanses. I could name a few
others, if you pressed me. That brother of Fowndes who looks like an
up-state minister. A lot of women--Miller Gorse's sister, Mrs. Datchet,
who never approved of Miller. Quite a genteel gathering, I give you my
word, and all astonished and mad as hell when the speaking was over.
Mrs. Datchet said she had been living in a den of iniquity and vice, and
didn't know it."

"It must have been amusing," I said.

"It was," said Ralph. "It'll be more amusing later on. Oh, yes, there
was another fellow who spoke I forgot to mention--that queer Dick who
was in your class, Krebs, got the school board evidence, looked as if
he'd come in by freight. He wasn't as popular as the rest, but he's got
more sense than all of them put together."

"Why wasn't he popular?"

"Well, he didn't crack up the American people,--said they deserved all
they got, that they'd have to learn to think straight and be straight
before they could expect a square deal. The truth was, they secretly
envied these rich men who were exploiting their city, and just as long
as they envied them they hadn't any right to complain of them. He was
going into this campaign to tell the truth, but to tell all sides of
it, and if they want