"I don't know-" said Webster.
"We'd been waiting for you to come in," said Taylor. "We knew you'd finally have to come here. Any chance you might have had at any kind of job would have been queered by King. He passed the word along. You're blackballed by every Chamber of Commerce and every civic group in the world today."
"Probably I have no choice," said Webster.
"We didn't want you to feel that way about it," Taylor said. "Take a while to think it over, then come back. Even if you don't want the job we'll find you another one – in spite of King."
Outside the office, Webster found a scarecrow figure waiting for him. It was Levi Lewis, snaggle-toothed grin wiped off, rifle under his arm.
"Some of the boys said they seen you go in here," he explained. "So I waited for you."
"What's the trouble?" Webster asked, for Levi's face spoke eloquently of trouble.
"It's them police," said Levi. He spat disgustedly.
"The police," said Webster, and his heart sank as he said the words. For he knew what the trouble was.
"Yeah," said Levi. "They're fixing to burn us out."
"So the council finally gave in," said Webster.
"I just came from police headquarters," declared Levi. "I told them they better go easy. I told them there'd be guts strewed all over the place if they tried it. I got the boys posted all around the place with orders not to shoot till they're sure of hitting."
"You can't do that, Levi," said Webster sharply.
"I can't!" retorted Levi. "I done it already. They drove us off the farms, forced us to sell because we couldn't make a living. And they aren't driving us no farther. We either stay here or we die here. And the only way they'll burn us out is when there's no one left to stop them."
He shucked up his pants and spat again.
"And we ain't the only ones that feel that way," be declared. "Gramp is out there with us."
"Gramp!"
"Sure, Gramp. The old guy that lives with you. He's sort of taken over as our commanding general. Says he remembers tricks from the war them police have never heard of. He sent some of the boys over to one of them Legion halls to swipe a cannon. Says he knows where we can get some shells for it from the museum. Says we'll get it all set up and then send word that if the police make a move we'll shell the loop."
"Look, Levi, will you do something for me?"
"Sure will, Mr. Webster."
"Will you go in and ask for a Mr. Taylor? Insist on seeing him. Tell him I'm already on the job."
"Sure will, but where are you going?" "I'm going up to the city hall." "Sure you don't want me along?"
"No," declared Webster. "I'll do better alone. And, Levi-"
"Yes."
"Tell Gramp to hold up his artillery. Don't shoot unless he has to – but if he has, to lay it on the line."
"The mayor is busy," said Raymond Brown, his secretary.
"That's what you think," said Webster, starting for the door.
"You can't go in there, Webster," yelled Brown. He leaped from his chair, came charging around the desk, reaching for Webster. Webster swung broadside with his arm, caught Brown across the chest, swept him back against the desk. The desk skidded and Brown waved his arms, lost his balance, thudded to the floor.
Webster jerked open the mayor's door.
The mayor's feet thumped off his desk. "I told Brown-" he said.
Webster nodded. "And Brown told me. What's the matter, Carter. Afraid King might find out I was here? Afraid of being corrupted by some good ideas?"
"What do you want?" snapped Carter.
"I understand the police are going to burn the houses."
" That's right," declared the mayor, righteously. "They're a menace to the community."
"What community?"
"Look here, Webster-"
"You know, there's no community. Just a few of you lousy politicians who stick around so you can claim residence, so you can be sure of being elected every year and drag down your salaries. It's getting to the point where all you have to do is vote for one another. The people who work in the stores and shops, even those who do the meanest jobs in the factories, don't live inside the city limits. The businessmen quit the city long ago. They do business here, but they aren't residents."
"But this is still a city," declared the mayor.
"I didn't come to argue that with you," said Webster. "I came to try to make you see that you're doing wrong by burning those houses. Even if you don't realize it, the houses are homes to people who have no other homes. People who have come to this city to seek sanctuary, who have found refuge with us. In a measure, they are our responsibility."
"They're not our responsibility," gritted the mayor. "Whatever happens to them is their own hard luck. We didn't ask them here. We don't want them here. They contribute nothing to the community. You're going to tell me they're misfits. Well, can I help that? You're going to say they can't find jobs. And I'll tell you they could find jobs if they tried to find them. There's work to be done, there's always work to be done. They've been filled up with this new world talk and they figure it's up to someone to find the place that suits them and the job that suits them."
"You sound like a rugged individualist," said Webster.
"You say that like you think it's funny," yapped the mayor.
"I do think it's funny," said Webster. "Funny, and tragic, that anyone should think that way today."
"The world would be a lot better off with some rugged individualism," snapped the mayor. "Look at the men who have gone places-"
"Meaning yourself?" asked Webster.
"You might take me, for example," Carter agreed. "I worked hard. I took advantage of opportunity. I had some foresight. I did-"
"You mean you licked the correct boots and stepped in the proper faces," said Webster. "You're the shining example of the kind of people the world doesn't want today. You positively smell musty, your ideas are so old. You're the last of the politicians, Carter, just as I was the last of the Chamber of Commerce secretaries. Only you don't know it yet. I did. I got out. Even when it cost me something, I got out, because I had to save my self-respect. Your kind of politics is dead. They are dead because any tinhorn with a loud mouth and a brassy front could gain power by appeal to mob psychology. And you haven't got mob psychology any more. You can't have mob psychology when people don't give a damn what happens to a thing that's dead already – a political system that broke down under its own weight."
"Get out of here," screamed Carter. "Get out before I have the cops come and throw you out."
"You forget," said Webster, "that I came in to talk about the houses."
" It won't do you any good," snarled Carter. "You can stand and talk till doomsday for all the good it does. Those houses burn. That's final."
"How would you like to see the loop a mass of rubbish?" asked Webster.
"Your comparison," said Carter, "is grotesque."
"I wasn't talking about comparisons," said Webster.
"You weren't-" The mayor stared at him. "What were you talking about then?"
"Only this," said Webster. "The second the first torch touches the houses, the first shell will land on the city hall. And the second one will hit the First National. They'll go on down the line, the biggest targets first."