"Them Servants, they keep the Service itself right in their own families, father to son like. Only Mr. J. S. as is, he ain't got no son. Say, me sister's a scrublady an' she's got a swell job scrubbin' floors right here in the temple. Course, she don't get paid nothing, but she's fed good, and as for clothes, the ladies round here gives her a lot. That's how I get these glad rags I'm wearin'-from sis. But I tell you a job like hers is great for gettin' wiser. Folks don't take much more notice of a scrublady than if she was a chair or sump'n. She's told me a lot o' things.
"Servants of Penn! Say, I reckon if that big image o' Penn could get a peep at what goes on under his feet he'd jump right down on top of the dome and smash the bell and everything else!"
The flow of her eloquence was interrupted by Drayton, who had been listening with even greater interest than the others. "Tell me, Miss Skidoo, have you or any of your friends an idea of who William Penn really is, or rather was?"
"I don't know nothin' about that Will-thing. Penn is the All-Father. He runs heaven and hell just like the Servants run us. I don't believe in him no more. I think there ain't nothing but Philadelphia, and when you die you stay dead?"
"Well, religion aside," said Drayton, "I myself have learned a great deal since this morning. The Penn Service library was really most informing. If its doors could be thrown open to the Numbers, I believe they are men enough yet to overthrow this government of false priests and their sycophants and come into their own. It would be worth living, just to see it done." He sighed. "However, that is not to be. We can help the sorrow of this age no more than we could cure the grief of our own."
"Get on with it, Bobby," said Trenmore. "Sure, I've a load of curiosity I'd hate to die burdened with!"
"I'll tell it as briefly as I can. There are big gaps in the story as I collated it, but the general run is clear enough. I became so absorbed that I forgot the time and the competitions and everything else. Remember, this is their history.
"It seems that after the close of the World Wars there followed a few years of respite. Then Communism had its way of Europe. Class war, which spells social chaos, ensued.
"The U.S.A. very sensibly and hastily declined to be further involved, but unfortunately did not stop there. The country had been largely militarized; but this new European outbreak swung the pacifists back into the saddle. You know the delirious possibilities which may spring from the brain of a full-fledged pacifist. The president then in office was a weakling, a dreamer, and completely under the influence of a man named Andrew Power. I'll tell you more of that later. Congress-I don't know what they were thinking of, but they backed this sawdust president, or rather the man behind his chair. According to the records, it appeared to all these wise rulers that the only safety lay in complete severance of relations with mad-dog Europe. So they severed them. They deliberately stopped all traffic and communication between the United States and Europe. Later, in logical sequence, they dropped communication with our nearest neighbors, Canada, Mexico, Central and South America."
"Why, Mr. Drayton!" exclaimed Viola incredulously. "How could they?"
"They did. I am telling you what I read in books and old newspapers of those times. Now this man I spoke of, this Andrew Power, who stood behind the presidential chair, seems to have been a sort of sublimified madman. His personality was of the Napoleonic order raised to the nth power. He was a madman, but he was a reasoning madman. Taking the theories and work of the pacifists, he carried them to a logical conclusion.
"The trouble with the world, he said, was that its communities, its nations, had grown too bulky and unwieldy. He pointed to the case of Switzerland, a small, therefore manageable, republic, with its efficient, well-equipped army, its contented people and high rate of wealth per capita. The United States was a republic, but it could never be like that. It was too big. All the really big countries, he said, were ill-balanced, ill-governed, and with a high percentage of poor and unemployed. The ideal nation would consist of not over three or four million souls, with a democratic government. It should be completely isolated from the world in a space compelling it to keep the population within that limit of three or four million. Each State in the Union, he argued, was a potential ideal republic, given the isolation which was apparently-but only apparently-impossible."
"But," cried Viola, her eyes wide and incredulous, "that was a hundred times worse than the secession of the South from the North!"
"I have told you," replied Drayton wearily, "that this man was mad. The whole world, I think, was mad. In this country, too, Communism had been lifting its disorganizing clamor. The madman carried the mad people with him. State by State, it seemed, they might handle what was daily becoming more ungovernable. If some States were rotten, let them rot alone; not infect the others. It was necessary to redistribute the population, but that does not appear to have troubled their maniacal energy. There were riots and battles. What sane people remained objected strenuously to the whole scheme. But Power-this Andrew Power, who stood behind the president-had the majority with him. I think that many clever, wealthy men foresaw opportunities for absolute despotism under open colors. At any rate, the scheme was carried out, each State accepting a population within its powers to feed."
"But that meant the end of civilization, the end of exchange!" "Oh, they arranged for exchange of products in a limited degree, but all other intercommunication, all exchange of ideas or moving about of people from one State to another, was cut off under heavy penalty."
"Their coast line, man-their coast line?" broke in Trenmore. "What was Europe doing then?"
"I don't know. The history of the world ends in that library with the isolation of Pennsylvania. For all I know, the nations of Europe may have emulated the Kilkenny cats and devoured one another, or perhaps they are still fighting. Anyway, what these people call 'Philadelphia and its environing suburbs' really includes the whole of Pennsylvania.
"They began here under a sort of commission government, but the 'contractor gang'-Philadelphia was always you know, peculiarly-"
He never told them, however, what it was that Philadelphia was peculiar in. There came a sound at the door. The heavy bolts slid back, and a man entered, partly closing the door behind him. The man was Cleverest. For an instant he stood, arms folded, glaring majestically upon them.
The captives rose and faced him with more or less composure. Had the high priest's nephew come to announce an advance of execution or to offer them further terms?
"You've stared long enough," said Trenmore brusquely. "What is it you want with us?"
"A little fair and decent treatment perhaps," snapped Cleverest. "Do you realize what a very unpleasant position you have placed me in? Every man in the Temple is laughing at me behind his hand for standing by a gang of beggars and getting insulted for my pains!"
Viola interposed quietly. "You are mistaken, sir. None of us has ever said a word to or about you that could be construed as an insult."
"Your brother meant to include me in his tirade addressed to my uncle," the man retorted gloomily.
Terry eyed him in obstinate dislike. "You led me to forget my honor, sir, and conspire against a woman. I'm not blaming you so much as myself; but 'twas a dirty deal, and well you know it!"
"You were ready enough at the time," sneered Cleverest with more truth than was pleasant. "However, matters are not yet too late to mend. Your death won't help Loveliest now. My uncle has settled that once for all. You've blundered and blundered until the best I can do is to save you and your sister. Miss Trenmore"-he eyed the girl with a coldly calculating eye-"I love you. I am offering you more than any other man in this city could offer. I desire a beautiful and accomplished wife, and you are better qualified than any one I have met. If you marry me you will be not merely Loveliest, which is in one sense an empty title, but the future Mrs. Justice Supreme!"