"You may be a rich man and own railways, but--"
"But I am not rich and I don't own railways. Lately bad feeling has been
growing on the Sagalac, and only a spark was needed to fire the ricks.
You struck the spark in your sermon last night. I don't see the end of it
all. One thing is sure--you're not going to take the funeral service
to-morrow."
The slack red lips of the man of God were gone dry with excitement, the
loose body swayed with the struggle to fight it out.
"I'll take no orders from you," the husky voice protested. "My conscience
alone will guide me. I'll speak the truth as I feel it, and the people
will stand by me."
"In that case you WILL take orders from me. I'm going to save the town
from what hurts it, if I can. I've got no legal rights over you, but I
have moral rights, and I mean to enforce them. You gabble of conscience
and truth, but isn't it a new passion with you--conscience and truth?"
He leaned over the table and fastened the minister's eyes with his own.
"Had you the same love of conscience and truth at Radley?"
A whiteness passed over the flabby face, and the beady eyes took on a
glazed look. Fight suddenly died out of them.
"You went on a missionary tour on the Ottawa River. At Radley you toiled
and rested from your toil--and feasted.
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