The Highflyers

thin his memory this handsome space had been a public market, unsightly, evil of odor, reeking with decaying vegetables and the refuse of the meat-stalls. To-day it was overcrowded with parked au

cipal government. As was the shabby building to its clean, its magnificent, neighbors, so was the thing it contained-the government of a great

mon councils, of mayors, of state legislatures, of national legislatures, differing only in deg

id to himself. "It hasn't

with human beings whose errands hurried them on. Potter studied them with interest. Their faces were mobile, alert, intelligent, forceful. There was a capability about each individual; there was something distinct about each atom in the crowd...

e width of Woodward Avenue; it was these who had made possible the building up of that miracle of industrial life that stretched around the town like fortifications around s

ess deep and dark. He raised his head without knowin

. "This is the machine; the stroke is there and the bore

ny. Since the day the first brick was laid, a dozen years before, building had never ceased. The plant had never caught up with itself, had never been able to produce the number of automobiles required of it by the public. As far as the ey

to pay, in paper standing for something more substantial. It was there. It could be beheld in the mass. Perhaps a hundred millions of dollars actually reared them

the broad flight of stairs leading

the man who sat behind

upied, Mr. Waite.

ack, and then sat down with a shrug. Potter flung open t

u heard?" he

frowned. "I'm busy. We

room; recognized Senator Marvel, did not re

It was without warning. More than a hundred Americans

en a sudden, bewildering blow to him. "What'

ce showed no emotion except, perhaps, a shade of irritation at the others' reception of the tidings. Potter said to himself that his father would sit outwardly unmoved, unruffled, not in the least disarranged mentally, if

ed the man whom P

l it mean?" the Senator asked

mean but war?

in fact, not as if Potter were a human being at all, but as if he were

ed a fact. Potter came near to smiling at the alacrity with which Senator and business man abandoned the news sheet and pressed it upon his father. The Senator was a big man in Washington and in Michigan, Potte

ll be no holding them back. They'll swe

ions shipped on the Lusit

isingly, from beginning to end what the paper told of the sinking of the Lus

, "and people were warned by advertiseme

re we going to let them murder our citizens

he boat," said the stranger. "

ly from Senator to business man-to his father, where they remained

especially, Potter. If you must wag your tongue, go back to the Pontchartrain bar and wag it f

want war, I can vouch for that.... But the p

r words that he'll

ere'll be no war. Those German dunder-heads! Do they

ols," said

Fabius Waite paused. "And when all's said and done it won't be the Senate nor the President nor business which

inion can

hing will come of it. It will take careful handling. You agree with me, do you no

ainly

he may have in mind to assume." Fabius Waite's eyes were on the Senator's face, and none could tell what thoughts stirred behind them. He did not order, did not direc

intimate as much to

rman government will hold the people in check. I incline to believe they will wait for it to see what the Presid

ve no stomach for a dose like that. Handle this thing right-let them get over the first shock of it

m. The word patriotism was not in his vocabulary, as it was not in the vocabularies of millions of Americans on that seventh day of May. But some spring had been touched, something had been set in motion by the news of that atrocity which would be heralded from one end to t

mething he felt to be right. Perhaps there was a tinge of adventure in it; perhaps his youth heard the rolling o

n; there had been but one thought-dollars. Business came first. The prosperity of dollars and cents filled their minds to the exclusion of all other prosperities

the news, but he considered their actions those of men who had not been shocked or those of men enraged. Perhaps they, too, were of one min

"if Mother had

. This one act can be smoothed over, but many recurrences of it cannot be smoothed over. Isn't the

resolution," said the Senator, "but p

at once? You don't mean to say, Dad, that you actually would have this country

nation will top them all. We'll be the financial rulers of the worl

an war. And war means armies and cannon and shell-and aeroplanes. We've got to have them all. Think, Dad, and you'll realize it.... Take a telegraph blank, Dad, and write the President. You can help with this plant; every other plant like it can help. Wire the President that this plant is at the disposal of

chorus girls and traffic

on't d

be a

k. Here sat a man who worked for wages, a common citizen. Here sat the sort

ans have sunk the Lusitania a

n't it? I j

e going to

t, that's what. We'll collect

" said

Mr. Wait

? Will that

Dickson, in real surprise.

fight? You don't

won't mix in any wars. We've been seeing what war means. Anyhow, what should we figh

n his heel. He

re the Pontchartrain and entered the bar. His friends were not there, but he s

ed upon askance by the respectable. His face was set-and he drank.... Fred La Mothe came through the revolving door, saw Potter, studied his f

, did not arise to eat. The lights came on and still he sat. The room was thronged

feet, and stood, not too steadily, and his eyes seemed to flame as he glared over the crowd. His face seemed to flame, to be kindling fr

fist and a glass danced over

he said, loudly, "and you're

face was turned toward him. He

en't the guts to kill back again. You're afraid, the lot of you. You won't fight. If anybody says war you crawl under the table.... Americans!... I'd rather be an Esquim

the center of a maelstrom of shouting, scuffling men-and his laugh rang above their shouts. They struck at him, clutched at him; waiters and bartenders tried to force their way to him. He was pushed back and back, still keeping his feet, still lashi

he jeered, "an

, recognized Potter, and stopped. "Cut it out now,

ht stick was out. He raised it, brought it down on Potter's yellow hair, and the whole room heard the thud of it.... Potter

y also printed moral editorials which, with singular unanimity, pointed out facts concerning young m