it was for exact and
unflinching veracity. Even to keep the _Post_ silent had been something
of a strain upon his instinct for truth, for a voice within him had
whispered that an honest journal _ought_ to have some opinion to express
on a matter so locally interesting as this. To publish this editorial
would strain the instinct to the breaking point and beyond. For it would
be equivalent to saying, whether anybody else but him knew it or not,
that he, the present editor of the _Post_ approved and endorsed West's
position, when the truth was that he did nothing of the sort.

At eight o'clock that night, he succeeded, after prolonged search of the
town on the part of the switchboard boy, in getting West to the
telephone.

"Mr. West," said Queed, "I am very sorry, but I don't see how I can
print your article."

"Oh, Lord!" came West's untroubled voice back over the wire. "And a
man's enemies shall be those of his own household. What's wrong with it,
Mr. Editor?"

Queed explained his reluctances. "If that is not satisfactory to you,"
he added, at the end, "as it hardly can be, I give you my resignation
now, and you yourself can take charge immediately."

"Bless your heart, no! Put it in the waste-basket. It doesn't make a
kopeck's worth of difference. Here's a thought, though. Do you approve
of the tactics of those _Chronicle_ fellows in the matter?"

"No, I do not."

"Well, why not show them up to-morrow?"

"I'll be glad to do it."

So Queed wrote a stinging little article of a couple of sticks' length,
holding up to public scorn journalistic redshirts who curry-combed the
masses, and preached class hatred for the money there was in it. It is
doubtful if this article helped matters much. For the shameless
_Chronicle_ seized on it as showing that the _Post_ had tried to defend
the president, and utterly failed. "Even the West organ," so ran its
brazen capitals, "does not dare endorse its darling. And no wonder,
after the storm of indignation aroused by the _Chronicle's_ fearless
exposures."

West kept his good humor and self-control intact, but it was hardly to
be expected that he enjoyed venomous misrepresentation of this sort. The
solidest comfort he got in these days came from Sharlee Weyland, who did
not read the _Chronicle_, and was most beautifully confident that
whatever he had done was right. But after all, the counselings of Miss
Avery, of whom he also saw much that spring, better suited his
disgruntl