n accents.

The crowd was so thick that Frank could not get close enough to hear
Ruef's words. It seemed a confession or condonation. Scattered fragments
reached Frank's ears. Then the judge's question, clearly heard, "What is
your plea?"

"Guilty!" Ruef returned.

* * * * *

Ruef's confession served to widen the breach between Class and Mass. He
implicated many corporation heads and social leaders in a sorry tangle
of wrongdoing. Other situations added fuel to the flame of economic war.
The strike of the telephone girls had popular support, a sympathy much
strengthened by the charges of bribery pending against telephone
officials.

[Illustration: All at once he stepped forward.... Tears were streaming
down his face. Then the judge's question, clearly heard, "What is your
plea?" "Guilty!" Ruef returned.]

Ten thousand ironworkers were on strike at a time when their service was
imperative, for San Francisco was rebuilding feverishly. Capital made
telling use of this to bolster its impaired position in the public mind.
While "pot called kettle black," the city suffered. The visitation of
some strange disease, which certain physicians hastened to classify
as bubonic plague, very nearly brought the untold evils of a quarantine.
A famous sanitarian from the East decided it was due to rats. He came
and slew his hundred-thousands of the rodents. Meanwhile the malady had
ceased. But there were other troubles.

Fire had destroyed the deeds and titles stored in the Recorder's office,
as well as other records. Great confusion came with property transfer
and business contracts. But, worst of all, perhaps, was the street
car strike.

"It seems as though the Seven Plagues of Egypt were being repeated,"
remarked Frank to his uncle as they lunched together. They had come to
be rather good companions, with the memory of Bertha between them. For
Frank, within the past twelve months, had passed through much
illuminating experience.

Robert Windham, too, was a changed man. He cared less for money. Frank
knew that he had declined big fees to defend some of the "higher ups"
against impending charges of the graft prosecution. Windham smiled as he
answered Frank's comment about the Seven Plagues.

"We'll come out of it with flying colors, my boy. A city is a great
composite heart that keeps beating, sometimes fast, sometimes slow, but
the healthy blood rules in the main; it conquers all passing
dist