reading the brotherhood
of the world idea--sweat brothers, he calls them. But he was mighty
careful never to get in a perspiration himself."

"We might try Herman again. But I'd keep an eye on him."

So Herman was taken on at the new munition plant. He was a citizen,
he owned property, he had a record of long service behind him. And, at
first, he was minded to preserve that record intact. While he had by
now added to his rage against the Fatherland's enemies a vast and sullen
fury against invested capital, his German caution still remained.

He would sit through fiery denunciations of wealth, nodding his head
slowly in agreement. He was perfectly aware that in Gus's little back
room dark plots were hatched. Indeed, on a certain April night Rudolph
had come up and called him onto the porch.

"In about fifteen minutes," he said, consulting his watch in the
doorway, "I'm going to show you something pretty."

And in fifteen minutes to the dot the great railroad warehouses near the
city wharf had burst into flames. Herman had watched without comment,
while Rudolph talked incessantly, boasting of his share in the
enterprise.

"About a million dollars' worth of fireworks there," he said, as the
glare dyed their faces red. "All stuff for the Allies." And he boasted,
"When the cat sits on the pickhandle, brass buttons must go."

By that time Herman knew that the "cat" meant sabotage. He had nodded
slowly.

"But it is dangerous," was his later comment. "Sometimes they will
learn, and then?"

His caution had exasperated Rudolph almost to frenzy. And as time went
on, and one man after another of the organization was ferreted out at
the new plant and dismissed, the sole remaining hope of the organization
was Herman. With his reinstatement their hopes had risen again, but to
every suggestion so far he had been deaf. He would listen approvingly,
but at the end, when he found the talk veering his way, and a circle of
intent faces watching him, he would say:

"It is too dangerous. And it is a young man's work. I am not young."

Then he would pay his score, but never by any chance Rudolph's or the
others, and go home to his empty house. But recently the plant had gone
on double turn, and Herman was soon to go on at night. Here was
the gang's opportunity. Everything was ready but Herman himself. He
continued interested, but impersonal. For the sake of the Fatherland he
was willing to have the plant go, and to lose his work. H