n, because they're the cheapest. I don't know as I blame 'em for
that. But this business of hiring a bunch of ex-cons and--Hey! Where are
you goin'?"

Banneker was beyond the door before the query was completed. Looking out
of the window, the agent saw a fat and fussy young mother, who had
contrived to get through the line, waddling at her best speed across the
open toward the station, and dragging a small boy by the hand. A lank
giant from the guards' ranks was after her. Screaming, she turned the
corner out of his vision. There were sounds which suggested a row at the
station-door, but the agent, called at that moment to the wire, could
not investigate. The train came and went, and he saw nothing more of the
ex-railroader from the West.

Although Mr. Horace Vanney smiled pleasantly enough when Banneker
presented himself at the office to make his report, the nature of the
smile suggested a background more uncertain.

"Well, what have you found, my boy?" the financier began.

"A good many things that ought to be changed," answered Banneker
bluntly.

"Quite probably. No institution is perfect."

"The mills are pretty rotten. You pay your people too little--"

"Where do you get that idea?"

"From the way they live."

"My dear boy; if we paid them twice as much, they'd live the same way.
The surplus would go to the saloons."

"Then why not wipe out the saloons?"

"I am not the Common Council of Sippiac," returned Mr. Vanney dryly.

"Aren't you?" retorted Banneker even more dryly.

The other frowned. "What else?"

"Well; the housing. You own a good many of the tenements, don't you?"

"The company owns some."

"They're filthy holes."

"They are what the tenants make them."

"The tenants didn't build them with lightless hallways, did they?"

"They needn't live there if they don't like them. Have you spent all
your time, for which I am paying, nosing about like a cheap magazine
muckraker?" It was clear that Mr. Vanney was annoyed.

"I've been trying to find out what is wrong with Sippiac. I thought you
wanted facts."

"Precisely. Facts. Not sentimental gushings."

"Well, there are your guards. There isn't much sentiment about them. I
saw one of them smash a woman in the face, and knock her down, while she
was trying to catch a train and get out of town."

"And what did you do?"

"I don't know exactly how much. But I hope enough to land him in the
hospital. They pulled me off too soon."

"Do you