de those blockaders, and see
that the dead ones are decently buried."

"You have tackled a big job, my son."

"I like big jobs, Padre. They're worth while. Maybe I'll be able to
keep some of the boys home--the town needs them. Maybe I can keep some
of those poor kids out of the mills, too. Oh, yes, I expect a right
lively time!"

I was silent. I knew how supinely Appleboro lay in the hollow of a
hard hand. I had learned, too, how such a hand can close into a
strangling fist.

"Of course I can't clean up the whole state, and I can't reorganize
the world," said the boy sturdily. "I'm not such a fool as to try. But
I can do my level best to disinfect my own particular corner, and make
it fit for men and safe for women and kids to live and breathe in.
Padre, for years there hasn't been a rotten deal nor a brazen steal in
this state that the man who practically owns and runs this town hadn't
a finger in, knuckle-deep. _He's got to go_."

"Goliath doesn't always fall at the hand of the son of Jesse, my
little David," said I quietly. I also had dreamed dreams and seen
visions.

"That's about what my father says," said the boy. "He wants me to be a
successful man, a 'safe and sane citizen.' He thinks a gentleman
should practise his profession decently and in order. But to believe,
as I do, that you can wipe out corruption, that you can tackle poverty
the same as you would any other disease, and prevent it, as smallpox
and yellow fever are prevented, he looks upon as madness and a waste
of time."

"He has had sorrow and experience, and he is kind and charitable, as
well as wise," said I.

"That's exactly where the hardest part comes in for us younger
fellows. It isn't bucking the bad that makes the fight so hard: it's
bucking the wrong-idea'd good. Padre, one good man on the wrong side
is a stumbling-block for the stoutest-hearted reformer ever born. It's
men like my father, who regard the smooth scoundrel that runs this
town as a necessary evil, and tolerate him because they wouldn't soil
their hands dealing with him, that do the greatest injury to the
state. I tell you what, it wouldn't be so hard to get rid of the
devil, if it weren't for the angels!"

"And how," said I, ironically, "do you propose to set about smoothing
the rough and making straight the crooked, my son?"

"Flatten 'em out," said he, briefly. "Politics. First off I'm going to
practice general law; then I'll be solicitor-general for this county.