deceiving yourself. It's a
process that takes longer with some than with others, but after a while
wrong becomes right in your mind and you can do evil from the highest
motives. And after you deceive yourself you deceive others, using good
people for your tools. The devil always chooses the best people to do
his work."

"And isn't it because of this," Kathleen rushed in, believing that she
would secure recognition at last, "that we're fighting in the unions and
in the Party [there was but one political party to Kathleen] to down the
oppressor and to take possession of the earth?"

"Whom are you going to do it with?" the Major asked dryly. "Why do you
think one set of men will be better than another? It's all right for you
to try, but you will never succeed. Just when your impetus is at its
best, rapacious leaders will appear and steal all that you have given
your lives to gain."

"There is no animal so easily deceived as man," he went on. "Stupidity,"
and he looked hard at Applebaum, "is the most noticeable of human
traits. You can trap a man with a piece of tainted meat that a wolf
would despise. Give him a symbol, it matters not what--a delphic oracle,
a church, an empire--and he will rally to the call of greed and fight
its battles manfully. With the cry of victory on their lips I could, and
have led native troops to destroy their own homes."

"Oh, Major dear!" Kathleen cried incredulously.

"Of course they didn't know what they were doing," the old man said. A
smile lit up his face and in a moment he looked so handsome and
venerable that two of his listeners, at least, forgot his rudeness.
"Most men do not see the end of the road. My father was a soldier and
sincerely religious. He thought when fighting in the service that he was
bringing Christ to the heathen; but when he got home and read of his
achievements he found that he had only forced China to trade in opium."

William Applebaum could no longer keep silent. "Why will you show only
the rotten side of things?" he asked, real passion in his voice. "All
wars are not actuated by greed and all men are not dupes. My grandfather
fought here in this country. He was a colonel and he battled to free the
slave."

"Yes?" said the Major. He turned and looked at Hertha. "You're from the
South?"

She nodded in affirmation.

"I heard it in your speech. Now how many colonels might there have been
in your family?"

"More than I can count," Hertha made answer, smil