''
``Why?'' said Jane.
``Victor Dorn,'' said Hull. ``Do you wonder that he interests
me? For instance, to-night: you see how it's raining. Well,
Victor Dorn had them print to-day fifty thousand leaflets about
this strike--what it means to his cause. And he has asked five
hundred of his men to stand on the corners and patrol the streets
and distribute those dodgers. I'll bet not a man will be
missing.''
``But why?'' repeated Jane. ``What for?''
``He wants to conquer this town. He says the world has to be
conquered--and that the way to begin is to begin--and that he has
begun.''
``Conquer it for what?''
``For himself, I guess,'' said Hull. ``Of course, he professes
that it's for the public good. They all do. But what's the
truth?''
``If I saw him I could tell you,'' said Jane in the full pride of
her belief in her woman's power of divination in character.
``However, he can't succeed,'' observed Hull.
``Oh, yes, he can,'' replied Jane. ``And will. Even if every
idea he had were foolish and wrong. And it isn't--is it?''
David laughed peculiarly. ``He's infernally uncomfortably right
in most of the things he charges and proposes. I don't like to
think about it.'' He shut his teeth together. ``I WON'T think
about it,'' he muttered.
``No--you'd better stick to your own road, Davy,'' said Jane with
irritating mockery. ``You were born to be thoroughly
conventional and respectable.
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