there, because he did his best when he
could, and it's not his fault that he's dead wood now. I've given in,
over and over again, in one way or another, sometimes against my
convictions, and oftener against my will. But one thing I've stuck to,
and that's my right to discharge a hand when I see fit, without
dictation from the Union or anybody else. In the past, this has been
comparatively easy sailing. One man, now and again, isn't a ripple on
the surface of four thousand employees. Besides, there was always a good
reason. The others saw that, and there was never a finger raised. They
believed in me, through and through, and it has been my pride to know
that they did, and that they had good cause to. But now it's different.
There has been a band of young good-for-nothings in Shop 22, who were
full, chock-a-block, of socialism, and equality, and workingmen's
rights, and God knows what-not! They've talked enough poisonous gas to
the other hands to blow up a state. They distributed pamphlets, and made
speeches, and organized clubs, and fomented discord, till I got sick and
tired of it. There wasn't one square day's work in the whole fifteen of
them put together. So, when I'd stood them as long as I could--which was
at ten o'clock yesterday morning--I discharged them all in a bunch, and
if there'd been a steep place handy, I'd have expected to see them all
run violently down it into the sea--like the other swine, in Scripture.
For if ever there was a band of devils made incarnate, it was that same
fifteen who were sowing anarchy broadcast through the Rathbawne Mills!

"Now--what? Lo and behold, they are all henchmen and disciples of
Michael McGrath, whom we in Kenton City know to our cost, and regular
and loyal members--save the mark!--of his Union. Well, gentlemen, I've
got that Union about my ears like a nest of hornets, with McGrath at the
head, and unless those fifteen men are reinstated by noon to-morrow, my
four thousand hands will be out on strike, and the Rathbawne Mills will
be tied up as tight as a drum!"

"Fight 'em!" said Colonel Broadcastle curtly, as the other paused.

"That's what I meant to do--but where am I going to come out? If I
thought, for instance, that I was going to have your regiment to back me
up, Broadcastle, or even the Kenton City police, why, well and good! But
_am_ I? No, sir! _No_, sir! Not with Elijah Abbott in the Governor's
chair, I'm not! You know that as well as I. Why, Broadcastle, I