vance, of taboo, of folkways, ends.
And into the brain of all living beings will be born the perfect
comprehension of their own indestructible divinity.

* * * * *

Part of this she ventured to say to Ilse Westgard one day, when they
had met for luncheon in a modest tea-room on Forty-third Street.

But Ilse, always inclined toward militancy, did not entirely agree
with Palla.

"To embody in one's daily life the principles of one's living faith is
scarcely sufficient," she said. "Good is a force, not an inert
condition. So is evil. And we should not sit still while evil moves."

"Example is not inertia," protested Palla.

"Example, alone, is sterile, I think," said the ex-girl-soldier of the
Battalion of Death, buttering a crescent. She ate it with the
delightful appetite of flawless health, and poured out more
chocolate.

"For instance, dear," she went on, "the forces of evil--of degeneration,
ignorance, envy, ferocity, are gathering like a tornado in Russia.
Virtuous example, sucking its thumbs and minding its own business, will
be torn to fragments when the storm breaks."

"The Bolsheviki?"

"The Reds. The Terrorists, I mean. You know as well as I do what they
really are--merely looters skulking through the smoke of a world in
flames--buzzards on the carcass of a civilisation dead. But, Palla,
they do not sit still and suck their thumbs and say, 'I am a
Terrorist. Behold me and be converted.' No, indeed! They are moving,
always in motion, preoccupied by their hellish designs."

"In Russia, yes," admitted Palla.

"Everywhere, dearest. Here, also."

"I believe there are scarcely any in America," insisted Palla.

"The country crawls with them," retorted Ilse. "They work like moles,
but already if you look about you can see the earth stirring above
their tunnels. They are here, everywhere, active, scheming, plotting,
whispering treason, stirring discontent, inciting envy, teaching
treason.

"They are the Russians--Christians and Jews--who have filtered in here
to do the nation mischief. They are the Germans who blew up factories,
set fires, scuttled ships. They are foreigners who came here poisoned
with envy; who have acquired nothing; whose greed and ferocity are
whetted and ready for a universal conflagration by which they alone
could profit.

"They are the labour leaders who break faith and incite to violence;
they are the I. W. W.; they are the Black Hand,