d. It was an outrage----"

"But my father was the largest owner of the railroad."

Hull colored violently. "You don't understand about business, Jen.
The railroad is a corporation. It fought the case--and the Dorns had
no money--and the railway owned the judge and bribed several jurors at
each trial. Dorn says that was what started him to thinking--to being
a revolutionist--though he doesn't call himself that."

"I should think it would!" cried Miss Hastings. "If my father had
known----" She caught her breath. "But he MUST have known! He was on
the train that day."

"You don't understand business, Jen. Your father wouldn't interfere
with the management of the corporation ."

"He makes money out of it--doesn't he?"

"So do we all get money out of corporations that are compelled to do
all sorts of queer things. But we can't abolish the system--we've got
to reform it. That's why I'm in politics--and want you----"

"Something must be done about that," interrupted Jane. "I shall talk
to father----"

"For heaven's sake, Jen," cried David in alarm, "don't tell your father
I'VE been stirring you up. He's one of the powers in politics in this
State, and----"

"I'll not give you away, Davy," said Miss Hastings a little
contemptuously. "I want to hear more about this Victor Dorn. I'll get
that money for him and his mother. Is he very poor?"

"Well--you'd call him poor. But he says he has plenty. He runs a
small paper. I think he makes about twenty-five dollars a week out of
it--and a little more out of lecturing. Then--every once in a while he
goes back to his trade--to keep his hand in and enjoy the luxury of
earning honest money, as he puts it."

"How queer!" exclaimed Miss Hastings. "I would like to meet him. Is
he--very ignorant?"

"Oh, no--no, indeed. He's worked his way through college--and law
school afterward. Supported the family all the time."

"He must be tremendously clever."

"I've given you an exaggerated idea of him," Davy hastened to say.
"He's really an ordinary sort of chap."

"I should think he'd get rich," said Miss Hastings. "Most of the men
that do--so far as I've met them--seem ordinary enough."

"He says he could get rich, but that he wouldn't waste time that way.
But he's fond of boasting."

"You don't think he could make money--after all he did--going to
college and everything?"

"Yes--I guess he could," reluctantly admitted Davy. Then in a burst of
candor: