Thorne Guy
The Socialist

The man's face grew absolutely white, then, with a sudden eel-like movement, he twisted away from under the inspector's hand and vanished down the stairs.

In a flash the inspector and his companion were after him.

"Come on!" they shouted to the others, "come on, we shall want you!"

Rose and Conrad dashed after them. Mary could hear them stumbling down the stairs, and then a confused noise of shouting as if from the bowels of the earth.

She was left alone, standing there with Mr. Goodrick, when she suddenly became aware that the staircase leading to the upper part of the house had become crowded with noiseless figures, looking down upon what was toward with motionless, eager faces.

"What shall we do?" Mary said. "What does it all mean?"

"I am sure I don't know," Goodrick answered, "but if you are not afraid, don't you think we had better follow our friends? I suppose the inspector is after some thief or criminal whom he has just recognised."

"I am not afraid," Mary said.

"Come along, then," he answered, and together they went to the end of the hall and stumbled down some greasy steps.

A light was at the bottom, red light through an open door, and they turned into a sort of kitchen.

There was nobody there, but one man who crouched in a corner and a fat, elderly Jewish woman, whose mouth dropped in fear, and whose eyes were set and fixed in terror, like the eyes of a doll.

Through an open door in a corner of the kitchen beyond there came strange sounds – oaths, curses – sounds which seemed even farther away than the door suggested that they were.

The sounds seemed to rise up from the very bowels of the earth, from some deeper inferno even than this.

Then Mary, for the first time, began to be in real terror. She clung to the imperturbable little editor.

"Oh, what is it?" she cried. "What does it all mean?"

The Jewess turned round with an almost crouching attitude and peered fearfully into the dimly lit gloom through the doorway. Then, quite suddenly, without any warning, she fell back against the wall of the kitchen and began to shriek and wail like a lost soul. As she did so, and through her piercing shrieks, Mary heard the distant noises were becoming louder and louder.

She reeled in the hot and filthy air of this dreadful place and pressed her hand against the wall for support. Even as she did so she saw the two police inspectors stagger into the room, bearing a burden between them, the burden, as it seemed, of a dead man.

Then everything began to sway, the place was filled with a louder and louder noise, the whole room grew fuller and fuller of people, and Mary Marriott fainted dead away.

CHAPTER XII
AT THE BISHOP'S TOWN HOUSE

The library was a noble one for a London house. The late sun of the summer afternoon in town poured into the place and touched all the golden and crimson-laden shelves in glory. From floor to roof the great tomes winked and glittered in the light.

Here the sun fell upon the glazed-fronted cabinets, which held the priceless first editions of modern authors. There it illuminated those cabinets which confined and guarded the old black-letter editions of the bishop's famous collection of medieval missals. It was a dignified home of lettered culture and ease.

Lord Camborne was sitting in a great armchair of green leather. In his own house he smoked a pipe, and a well-seasoned briar was gripped in his left hand as he leaned forward and looked at his son. On the opposite side of the glowing fireplace, on each side of which stood pots of great Osmunda ferns, which glistened in the firelight as if they had been cunningly japanned, Lord Hayle was sitting. His face was quite white, his attitude one of strained attention, as he listened to the wordy and didactic utterances of the earl.

"I don't know what to make of it, my dear Gerald," the bishop said. "Upon my soul, I don't know what to make of it! Such a thing has never happened before in all my experience. Indeed, I don't suppose that such an occurrence has ever been known."

"You are quite right, father," Lord Hayle replied; "but that is not the question. The question is: Where is my poor friend? Where is John?"

The bishop threw out two shapely hands with a curious gesture of indecision and bewilderment. "Gerald," he said, "if I could answer that question I should satisfy the press of Europe and put society at rest."

"But it is the most extraordinary thing, father," Lord Hayle said. "Here is John involved in this terrible railway accident. As far as we know – as far as we can know, indeed – he was rescued from the débris of the broken carriage perfectly unhurt. That young Doctor Jenkins was perfectly certain that the man whom he rescued and told to lie down for half an hour, to avoid the nervous effects of the shock, must have been the Duke of Paddington. He has assured me, he has assured Colonel Simpson, he has assured everybody in short that it was certainly the duke! In three-quarters of an hour he goes back to find his patient, and, meanwhile meeting Colonel Simpson, who had come down the line in frightful anxiety about the duke, there – where John had been – was nobody at all! Do you suppose that, as the Pall Mall Gazette has hinted, that John was temporarily deranged by the shock and walked away and lost himself? There seems to be no other explanation."

"But that is impossible," the bishop replied. "If he had done so would he not have been found in an hour or two?"

"I suppose he would," Lord Hayle answered. "I suppose he would, father."

"Then, all I can say," the bishop said, with an air of finality, "all I can say is that the thing is as black and mysterious as anything I have ever known in the whole course of my experience. There we were, you and myself and your sister, lunching at Paul's with the duke, when the news came of the outrage in Piccadilly. The duke went up to town by the six o'clock train. The accident occurred, and now the whole of society is trembling in suspense to know what has happened to your friend. I cannot tell you, Gerald, how it has distressed me; and," the bishop continued, with a slight hesitation in his voice, "your sister also is very much upset."

"Well, naturally, Connie would be," Lord Hayle returned. "But think what it must be to me, father! It is worse for me than for anybody. You have met the duke, Connie has met him; but I have been his intimate friend for the whole of the time we have been up at Oxford together, and I am at a loose end, I am simply heart-broken."

"My dear Gerald," said the splendid old gentleman from the armchair, with some unctiousness, "God ordains these things, these trials, for all of us; but be sure that, in His own good time, all will come right. We must be patient and trust in the Divine Will."

The young man looked at his father with a curious expression upon his face. He was very fond of his distinguished parent, and had a reverence for his abilities, but somehow or other at that moment the bishop's adjuration did not seem to ring quite true. Youth is often intolerant of the pious complacency of late middle-age!

It was about seven o'clock. At nine o'clock there was a small dinner party. The Home Secretary was to be there.

"I wonder," Lord Hayle said, at length, "if Sir Anthony will have any news?"

"I am sure I hope so," the bishop answered. "I saw him this morning in Whitehall, and he told me that everything that could possibly be done was being done. The whole of Scotland Yard, in fact, is bending its attention to the discovery of the whereabouts of your friend."

"I wish," Lord Hayle returned grimly, "I wish we could have a Johnnie like Sherlock Holmes on John's trek. There don't seem to be any of that sort of people outside the magazines."

At that moment the door of the library opened, and the butler came in. He carried a pile of evening papers upon a tray.

"These are the latest editions, my lord," he said, bringing them up to the bishop.

The father and son took the papers and opened them hurriedly.

Huge head-lines greeted their eyes. "Where is the duke?" "Has the duke disappeared with intention?" "Last news of the missing duke." "Rumours that the Duke of Paddington has taken a berth on the Lucania under the name of John Smith." "If the duke does not return, what will this mean to the ground-rents of London?" and so forth, and so forth, and so forth.

The bishop put down the papers with a weary sigh.

"The same thing," he said, "my dear Gerald, the same sort of thing."

Lord Hayle looked up at his father.

"Yes," he answered, "what fools these journalists are!"

"No, my dear boy, they are not fools. When they have anything to write about, they write about it rather well. When they haven't, of course they must manufacture."

"A confounded swindle, I call it!" said Lord Hayle.

The bishop did not answer. He remembered how much he owed to the press of London and the provinces for his advancement in the Church.

"Well," Lord Hayle said, "I shall go up-stairs, father, to my own room and have a tub and a pipe, and think the whole thing over. I suppose we may hear something from Sir Anthony at dinner to-night."

"My dear boy," the bishop replied, "I'm sure I hope so."

Lord Hayle had already risen from his seat, and was walking towards the door of the library when the butler entered once more. He bore a silver salver, upon which was a card, and went straight up to Lord Camborne.

"My lord," he said, "there is a gentleman waiting in the morning-room. He desires to see you upon a most important matter. I told the gentleman that your lordship was probably engaged, but he would not be denied."

"I cannot see anybody," the bishop replied, rather irritably. "Take the card to the chaplain."

"I beg your lordship's pardon," said the butler, "but I think this is a gentleman whom your lordship would wish to see."

The bishop pulled out his single eye-glass – he was the only prelate upon the bench who wore one – and looked at the card upon the tray.

"Good gracious!" he said, with a sudden sharpness in his voice. "This fellow! How dare – "

"Who has come to see you?" Lord Hayle asked.

The bishop's face was flushed. There was indignation in his voice, contempt in his eyes, and angry irritation in his pose.

"Look here, Gerald!" he said, taking the card and holding it out to his son in answer. "Who do you suppose has come to see me? Look!"

Lord Hayle took up the card.

"By Jove!" he said. "James Fabian Rose! Why, that's the great Socialist Johnny, isn't it, father? The man who writes plays and lectures, and is on the County Council and all that. I think we had him down at Oxford once, and I am not sure that we did not drive him out of the town."

"That is the man," the bishop answered; "one of the most brilliant intellects and unscrupulous characters in London to-day. It is not too much to say, Gerald, that this man is a perfect danger and menace to society, and to our – our order."

"Then what has he come to see you for, father?"

"Goodness only knows!" said the bishop. "I certainly shall not see him."

The butler was an old and privileged family servant. He had said nothing while this dialogue was in progress. Now he turned to his master.

"If you will allow me to say so, my lord," he said, "I think the gentleman should be seen. I don't think that it is an ordinary visit at all. It bears no indication of being an ordinary visit at all."

The bishop snapped his fingers once or twice.

"Oh, well, Parker," he said, "show him in, show him in; but explain that I have only three minutes, and that I am very busy. Gerald, you might as well wait. It might be interesting for you to see this creature."

In half a minute the butler opened the door and showed in the man with the face as white as linen, the mustard-coloured beard and moustache, and the keen lamp-like eyes.

Rose was dressed in his usual lounge suit, cut with about as much regard to convention as a ham sandwich. His tall figure bent forwards in eagerness, and he was certainly a disreputable note in this stronghold of aristocracy. Yet, nevertheless, his personality blazed out in the room as if some one had lit a Roman candle in the library.

The bishop rose, stately, portly, splendid.

"Mr. Rose," he said, "to what do I owe the pleasure of your visit? I am rather pressed for time."

"Something very important, indeed, my lord," the Socialist answered, in quick, incisive accents. "I should not have intruded upon you unless I had something most special to say."

"I understand that, Mr. Rose," the bishop replied, though the courteous smile with which he said it robbed his remark of something of its sting. "You and I, Mr. Rose, represent two quite different points of view, do we not?"

"I suppose we do," said the great Socialist, with a sudden vigour and amusement in his eyes; "but that is not what I have come here for to-night. May I ask, my lord," he said, looking towards Lord Camborne's son, "may I ask if this is Lord Hayle?"

"That is my name, Mr. Rose," the young man replied, rather startled at the sudden question.

"Oh, thank you," Rose said. "I have come here specially to see you to-night."

There was a moment's pause.

"Your business, Mr. Rose?" said the bishop once more.

"Is this," Rose rejoined. "The Duke of Paddington has sent me with a very special message to his friend, Lord Hayle. If Lord Hayle was not in London, his grace asked me to see Lord Camborne."

The bishop started violently. "My dear Mr. Rose," he said, in a deep voice, "what is all this? What is all this? The Duke of Paddington! Do you mean to say – "

"The Duke of Paddington, my lord," Rose answered, a subtle mockery becoming somewhat apparent in his voice, "the Duke of Paddington has been discovered!"

"Good Lord!" Lord Hayle shouted out suddenly, in the high-pitched voice of almost uncontrollable excitement. "You have found dear old John! Where is John, Mr. Rose?"

There was something so spontaneous and sincere in the young man's voice that the Socialist turned with a certain brightness and pleasure to the young man.

"Oh, sir!" he said, "the duke is lying at my house in Westminster. He has been kidnapped by criminal ruffians, and, I am sorry to say, has been tortured in order that large sums of money might be extorted from him. The doctors are with him now, and no serious injury has been done, but he is especially anxious to see you. I have a cab waiting, if you care to come at once."

"I'll have my coat on in a moment," Lord Hayle replied, and left the room.

The bishop went up to James Fabian Rose.

"Sir," he said, "our difference of opinion in social economics and political affairs shall not prevent me from gripping you very heartily by the hand."

CHAPTER XIII
NEW FRIENDS: NEW IDEAS

It was three days after the strange and dramatic rescue of the Duke of Paddington, and he lay in a bright, cheerful bedroom in James Fabian Rose's house in Westminster. Providence had guided Rose and his companions to the underground cellar in the nick of time. The relentless ruffians who had captured the duke had been as good as their word. They had treated him with indescribable ferocity, though into the details of the horrors in the foundation of the old house it is not necessary to go.

When the police inspectors had brought him up from the deepest hole of all, he was unconscious, and had immediately been taken away to Rose's own house in a horse ambulance which had been summoned from the police headquarters of the district.

The actual discovery had been very simple. Directly the Inspector of Police recognised the man known as "Sidney," he had rushed after him, followed by the others. As it happened, for some time the police had been very anxious to discover the exact whereabouts of this particular ex-convict, to track him to his lair. It was obvious that when the man turned and bolted down the stairs there was something he wished to conceal, and, though there was no actual charge against him at the moment, the policeman had experience enough to know that something illegal was afoot. They had dashed into the kitchen to find it tenanted only by the old Jewish woman, but the door leading into the smaller kitchen was open, and Sidney was leaning over the trap-door in the floor pulling up another member of the gang who had been down in the pit with the victim.

The man's design had obviously been to get his comrade up, close the trap-door, and push the tub over it before the policemen could enter the kitchen. In all probability there would then have been no discovery at all, though the ruffian himself was by no means sure that the party were not in some way or other upon the track of the actual offence he had committed in kidnapping the duke. His guilty conscience had betrayed him.

When the scoundrel had been caught and handcuffed, and the duke had been discovered and carried up into the kitchen the man relapsed into a sullen silence. He had gathered at once from the remarks made by his captors that they were quite unaware of the identity of the prisoner. It did not, in fact, occur to any of the party, even to the police, to connect this insensible figure, half-clothed – the face covered with grime and dirt – with the missing peer.

"We will get the poor fellow off to the hospital at once, sir," Inspector Green had said to Rose. "These devils have been working some horrible thing upon him. I expect he is one of their pals who has given them away. I have seen some black things, but this is about as bad as any of them. I should not wonder" – he turned round with his face like a flint, and a voice that cut like a whip – "I should not wonder if this was a swinging job for you, Sidney O'Connor!"

"He certainly shall not go to the hospital," said Rose. "Not that they won't look after him thoroughly there; but I could not allow anybody whom I discovered myself in such a plight as this to do so. He must go to my house, and my wife and Miss Marriott will nurse him."

"Well, sir," said the officer, "it is only a very little distance farther to your house from here than to Charing Cross Hospital, and I will send the ambulance there if you really wish it. It's very kind of you, Mr. Rose."

"Certainly I do," Rose answered. "It is a duty, of course."

"And I," said Mary Marriott, "will drive back at once if a cab can be found for me, to tell Mrs. Rose that they are bringing this poor man."

"That will be very kind of you, Miss Marriott," Rose answered. "I am sorry that our expedition has come to so unpleasant and dramatic an end, for I do not suppose any of us would care to go on now?"

"No, indeed," said both the clergyman and the journalist in answer, and in a few minutes Mary's first experience of the dark under-currents of London life was at an end.

When the duke was comfortably installed in Rose's house the doctor pronounced him suffering from shocks and extreme weakness.

"He will be all right in a few days," he said. "He must now have absolute rest and nourishment. The actual harm inflicted upon him by the scoundrels with whom he was found is very slight. There are the merest superficial burns, and the cuts are trivial. It is the weakness and shock that are the most serious. The young man has a splendid constitution. He's as strong as an ox."

The doctor went away, leaving minute directions for the treatment of the patient.

The duke was in a semi-conscious condition. He realised dimly that he was out of the horrible place where he had lain for, so it seemed to him, an eternity. He knew that, somehow or other, he had been rescued, that he was now lying in a comfortable bed. A new life seemed slowly coming back into his veins as the meat jelly dissolved in his mouth. The horror was ended at last!

He had fallen at length into a deep slumber.

The party assembled in the drawing-room, discussing the extraordinary events of the morning, and Mrs. Rose was told every detail. The police and the County Council inspector were not there, but the chief inspector had promised to report later as to anything that should be learned of the truth of the mystery.

"Well," said Mr. Goodrick, with a little chuckle, "I went out this morning because I wanted to watch Miss Marriott, and because I am interested in the great experiment we are making with her. I had seen all that sort of thing before I knew Miss Marriott; in fact, I began my journalistic career by writing of such places as we have been among; but I never expected that I was going to get a journalistic scoop. This will make a fine column in to-morrow's paper. The junior members of my staff will be jealous of their editor-in-chief going out and bringing in copy! They will regard it as an infringement of their rights!" He chuckled once more, and rubbed his hands together, all the true pressman's delight at exclusive news glowing in his eyes.

"Yes," he went on, "it will be quite a big thing, especially as you were present, Rose – a real sensation! The Wire will solve the mystery that is agitating the mind of the public in a most startling fashion!"

A maid came into the room. "If you please, sir," she said to Rose, "Inspector Green is here, and wishes to see you immediately on a matter of great importance."

"Show him up, Annie," said the Socialist, and in a second or two more the inspector burst into the room, his usual calm and imperturbable manner strangely altered. He seemed to be labouring under some deep emotion.

"What is it, inspector?" Rose said, and instinctively all the people in the room rose up.

"The man," the inspector gasped, "the man we found in the cellar, ladies and gentlemen – it is – it is his Grace the Duke of Paddington himself!"

There was a dead silence. The faces of every one went pale with excitement.

"The Duke of Paddington?" Rose said in a startled and incredulous voice.

"His Grace himself, sir. As you know, his Grace's disappearance has been agitating the whole of Europe for the last day or two. It seems what happened was this. The duke was lying down on the side of the line after the railway accident. He was almost uninjured, but the doctor who rescued him ordered him to rest for half an hour. The gang of men in the slum hard by, attracted by the accident in the fog and the possibility of plunder, had come through a doorway in the wall which leads upon the line. They rifled the duke's pockets, and from their contents found out who he was.

"The leader of the gang, Sidney O'Connor, is one of the most dangerous and desperate criminals in the country, and, moreover, a man of great daring and resource. He it was who thought it would be an infinitely better stroke of business if he could kidnap the duke and hold him to ransom. Owing to the fog and the proximity of their den – it is one of the duke's own houses, by the way, you will remember – the kidnapping was easily affected, the duke being too weak and stunned by the accident to offer any resistance. It is by the mercy of Providence that we found him when we did. The old Jewish woman who keeps the den has confessed everything. How is his Grace, Mr. Rose?"

"Much better," said Mrs. Rose, "much better, inspector. The doctor has been here, and says he will be all right in a few days. He is suffering from extreme weakness and shock. He is now sleeping peacefully, and a nurse from the Westminster Hospital is with him."

Mr. Goodrick went up to the inspector. "Now look here, inspector," he said, "promise me one thing, that neither you nor your companions will give any of the details of this affair to the press. I shall see that it is well worth your while, all of you, to be silent until to-morrow morning. Can you answer for your colleague and the plain-clothes man who was with us?"

"Certainly I can, Mr. Goodrick," the inspector answered.

"Well, it will be worth five pounds each to them. And what about the County Council inspector?"

"He has gone back to Spring Gardens now, sir," Green replied, "but I can easily send a message up to him from Scotland Yard to that effect."

"I shall be most obliged if you will do so," said Mr. Goodrick, and then once more he gave a loud chuckle of triumph and rubbed his hands together. "Sensation!" he said in an ecstasy, "why, the Wire will have one of the biggest scoops of recent years to-morrow. Oh, what luck! Oh, what splendid luck! No other paper will have anything except the mere statement of the fact that the duke has been discovered under mysterious circumstances. Mrs. Rose, I must say good-bye; I must hurry off. Don't forget, inspector! Absolute secrecy!"

He made a comprehensive bow, which included all of them, patted Fabian genially upon the back, and rushed away.

"What do you suppose we had better do, inspector?" Rose asked.

"Well, sir, I don't quite know what there is to be done, except, perhaps, to telegraph to the head of the young gentleman's college at Oxford, and to Colonel Simpson, his agent. You see, the duke has no very near relatives, though he is connected with half the peerage. I shall take care, also, that the news is at once conveyed to Buckingham Palace. His Majesty has been most anxious during the last day or two, and inquiries are constantly reaching us. For the rest, I think it will be better that you should wait until his Grace regains consciousness and can say what he would like to be done."

The inspector had disappeared, and Rose, his wife, Mary, and Mr. Conrad, were left alone, looking at each other in amazement. Then suddenly Rose sat down and burst into laughter. The old elfin, mocking expression had returned to his face. The keen eyes twinkled with sardonic humour, the mustard-coloured beard and moustache wagged up and down, as the great man leant back in an ecstasy of mirth.

"All's well that ends well," he said at length, spluttering out his words. "Good heavens! what a marvellous day it has been! We go to the Duke of Paddington's property, so that Miss Marriott can get ideas for the part of the heroine in the play which is to draw all England to the iniquity of great landlords like the duke, who do nothing, and allow their agents to draw rents for rat-holes. Then we find the duke himself trussed up like a chicken in a gloomy cellar of one of his own filthy properties! What extraordinary tricks Fate does play sometimes! Who would have thought that such a thing could possibly happen? And, what is better still – what is more quaintly humorous than ever – here is the young gentleman with his hundred and fifty thousand a year and his great name and title, here! sleeping in my best bedroom – in the very headquarters of the party which is labouring to destroy monopolies such as his. I wonder what he will say when he wakes up and finds out where he is, poor fellow!"

"If he is a gentleman, as I suppose he is," said Mrs. Rose, "he will say 'Thank you' – not once, but several times, because, you know, Fabian dear, not only did you save his life, in the first instance by chance, but you brought him here instead of sending him to a hospital when you had no idea who he was."

"And that," Mary broke in, "is what I call practical socialism. Don't you allow, Mr. Rose, that the duke is a brother?"

"Oh, yes," the Socialist replied, "but no more and no less a brother because of his dukedom."

There was a tap at the door. The nurse had sent down a message that the gentleman upstairs was awake, had learned where he was, and would like to see Mr. Rose.

* * * * * *

This was what had occurred. For three days the duke had lain in bed, gradually growing stronger. Lord Hayle had visited him constantly, and when he was well enough to be moved he was to go straight to the Camborne's house in Grosvenor Street.

The sun poured into the bedroom – a cold, wintry sun, but still grateful enough after the fog and gloom of the last week. A fire crackled upon the hearth, and the duke lay propped up with pillows, smoking a cigarette. On a chair at the side of the bed sat Fabian Rose, and on a chair on the other side was Mr. Conrad, the clergyman. An animated conversation was in progress.

For the first time in his life the duke had met types to which he was utterly unaccustomed. He had known of Fabian Rose, of course; there was no one in England who did not know the great Socialist's name, and few people of the upper classes who had not, at some time or other, witnessed one of his immensely clever plays. But now the duke was finding that all his ideas were being rudely upset. They were in a process of transition. The man with the white face and the mustard-coloured beard, with the lambent humour, had captivated him. He felt drawn to Rose, though his predominant sensation when talking to his host was one of wild amazement, and as for the clergyman, the duke liked him also, though he was a type that he had never met before.

It was an odd situation indeed. Here was the great capitalist captured and cornered by two of the most militant Socialists of the day – and here – he was rather enjoying it!

"Well," he said, "I seem fated nowadays to be carried off into the camp of the enemy; but I like this captivity better than the first. All the same, I cannot in the least agree with you, Mr. Conrad, in what you say, that the law of England, as it stands at present, is simply in the interests of the classes with property. Poor people have just as much justice, I have always understood, as any others."

"It is not so," replied Mr. Conrad, shaking his head. "I wish it were. As I see it, as Rose sees it, as we Socialists see it, the law works wholly to protect property and the propertied, and to do whatever injustices the propertied people who control the State require of it.

"When a hungry man helps himself to the food he cannot pay for, a man in blue introduces him to a man on a bench, and the result of the interview is that the hungry one is put away and locked up for a lengthened time. When the people meet to discuss their miseries and to demand relief men in scarlet as well as in blue beat and cut them to death. The law of England, as it stands at present, is entirely built up upon what John Kenworthy has so aptly described as 'that Devil's Bible, the Codex Romanorum.' Rome built up a property system which asserted and maintained the rights of the selfish and cunning over those whom they cheated and robbed, and we have done precisely the same with similar results. It is just the same in England to-day as it is in Russia, though the English people are not able to assert themselves as their brethren in Russia are doing. Count Tolstoi has said that in both countries – in almost all countries, in fact, authority is in the hands of men who, like all the rest, are ever ready to sacrifice the commonweal if their own personal interests are at stake. These men encounter no resistance from the oppressed, and are wholly subject to the corrupting influence of authority itself. And yet we call ourselves a Christian nation!"