. Wait a minute, now. I'm not
saying that the 'Clarion' doesn't lie. All papers do, I guess. They have
to. But it's when we've cut loose on straight facts that we've got in
wrong."

"Give me an instance."

"Well, the sewing-girls' strike."

"Engineered by a crooked labor leader and a notoriety-seeking woman."

"I see the bunch have got to you already, and have filled you up with
their dope. Never mind that, now. We're supposed to be a sort of tribune
of the common people. Rights of the ordinary citizen, and that sort of
thing. So we took up the strike and printed the news pretty straight. No
other paper touched it."

"Why not?"

"Didn't dare. We had to drop it, ourselves. Not until we'd lost ten
thousand dollars in advertising, though, and gained an extra blot on our
reputation as being socialistic and an enemy to capital and all that
kind of rot."

"Wasn't it simply a case of currying favor with the working-classes?"

"According as you look at it." Apparently weary of looking at it at all,
McGuire Ellis tipped back in his chair and contemplated the ceiling.
When he spoke his voice floated up as softly as a ring of smoke. "How
honest are you going to be, Mr. Surtaine?"

"What!"

"I asked you how honest you are going to be."

"It's a question I don't think you need to ask me."

"I do. How else will I find out?"

"I intend the 'Clarion' to be strictly and absolutely honest. That's all
there is to that."

"Don't be so young," said McGuire Ellis wearily. "'Strictly and
absol'--see here, did you ever read 'The Wrecker'?"

"More than once."

"Remember the chap who says, 'You seem to think honesty as simple as
blindman's-buff. I don't. It's some difference of definition, I
suppose'? Now, there's meat in that."

"Difference of definition be hanged. Honesty is honesty."

"And policy is policy. And bankruptcy is bankruptcy."

"I don't see the connection."

"It's there. Honesty for a newspaper isn't just a matter of good
intentions. It's a matter of eternal watchfulness and care and expert
figuring-out of things."

"You mean that we're likely to make mistakes about facts--"

"We're certain to. But that isn't what I mean at all. I mean that it's
harder for a newspaper to be honest than it is for the pastor of a rich
church."

"You can't make me believe that."

"Facts can. But I'm not doing my job. You want to learn the details of
the business, and I'm wasting time trying to throw light into the deep