ng before we had to move
out of our little home in Alder Street. We've been movin' ever since,"
he cried, and tears of weakness were in his eyes, "until we've come to
this, and we'll have to get out of here in another week. God knows where
we'll go then."

Hodder shuddered.

"Then I found out how he done it--from a lawyer. The lawyer laughed at
me, too. Say, do you wonder I ain't got much use for your church people?
Parr got a corporation lawyer named Langmaid--he's another one of your
millionnaire crooks--to fix it up and get around the law and keep him
out of jail. And then they had to settle with Tim Beatty for something
like three hundred thousand. You know who Beatty is--he owns this
city--his saloon's around here on Elm Street. All the crooks had to
be squared. Say," he demanded aggressively, "are Parr and Langmaid any
better than Beatty, or any of the hold-up men Beatty covers? There's a
street-walker over there in those flats that's got a million times more
chance to get to heaven--if there is any--than those financiers, as they
call 'emselves--I ain't much on high finance, but I've got some respect
for a second story man now--he takes some risks! I'll tell you what they
did, they bought up the short car lines that didn't pay and sold 'em
to themselves for fifty times as much as they were worth; and they got
controlling interests in the big lines and leased 'em to themselves with
dividends guaranteed as high as eighteen per cent. They capitalized the
Consolidated for more millions than a little man like me can think of,
and we handed 'em our money because we thought they were honest. We
thought the men who listed the stock on the Exchange were honest. And
when the crash came, they'd got away with the swag, like any common
housebreakers. There were dummy directors, and a dummy president. Eldon
Parr didn't have a share--sold out everything when she went over two
hundred, but you bet he kept his stock in the leased lines, which
guarantee more than they earn. He cleaned up five million, they say....
My money--the money that might give that boy fresh air, and good doctors
....Say, you believe in hell, don't you? You tell Eldon Parr to keep his
charity,--he can't send any of it in here. And you'd better go back to
that church of his and pray to keep his soul out of hell."...

His voice, which had risen even to a higher pitch, fell silent. And all
at once, without warning, Garvin sank, or rather tumbled upon the bed,