an inmate of the household, old Allison had come to wish he had
not begun by prescribing that Cary and his tutor should regularly appear
at the family table. Once established there, Elmendorf speedily became
dominant. If friends of Miss Allison dropped in to luncheon and the chat
was of social matters or other girls, if Allison brought home
fellow-magnates to take pot-luck at his hospitable board, if Mrs.
Lawrence and her especial cronies discoursed on that never-ending
problem, the servants, if Forrest and his army friends came informally,
no matter what the subject or who the speakers, Elmendorf speedily
"chipped in," as Cary expressed it, and once in could not be driven out.
His pet theme was the wrongs of the wage-workers, his pet theory the
doctrine of incessant change. His watchword seemed to be "Whatever is is
wrong," for against the existing order of things in state, society, or
home he was ever ready to wage determined war. Armed with propensities
such as these, a profound conviction of his own sense and sagacity and
consummate distrust in those of everybody else, it is easy to see that
once encouraged to break the ice and join in the current of conversation
he could not readily be eliminated. A man of good education was
Elmendorf, and during the European trip he had not been so much in the
way, but once home again, more and more as the winter wore on did the
head of the household find himself wishing he had never set eyes on the
man. He heard of him presently as addressing socialistic meetings and
appearing prominently at the sessions of the labor unions. Then in the
columns of papers of marked anarchistic tendencies, that had been under
the ban ever since the riots of '86, long articles began to appear over
his initials, and both in his speeches and in his contributions
Elmendorf was emphatic in his condemnation of capital, and in his
demands that labor should unite, unite everywhere, and by concerted and
persistent effort wring from the congested coffers of capital--Elmendorf
loved alliteration--a large share of its hoarded wealth. The hands that
wrought the fabric, said he, should share and share alike in every
profit. The man who riveted the bolt or swung the hammer deserved equal
wage with him whose brain evolved the plan, or whose fortune built the
mammoth plant and purchased the costly machinery.

"What I employed him for," said Allison, "was to prepare Cary for
college, and to keep him out of mischief;