Page:The unhallowed harvest (1917).djvu/151

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146
THE UNALLOWED HARVEST

"I know; but his advocacy counts for nothing so long as he preaches from a capitalistic pulpit. If he wants to be of real service to us let him cut loose from the Church and come with us."

"He is trying to make his church a church of the people, where every one, rich and poor, will stand on an equal footing."

"He can't do it. No one can do it. The whole ecclesiastical system would have to be changed to accomplish it. His spectacular crusade will amount to nothing. He's only stirring up trouble for the laboring people. He's making the rich angry, and they'll take it out on the poor. He's making the capitalists afraid, and they'll turn the screws tighter on the men that work for them. I hope Mrs. Bradley will not see this man. It can do her no possible good, and may injure the cause."

Mary Bradley, who had been quiet since Lamar entered into the conversation, turning her eloquent eyes from one to the other of the speakers, now spoke up on her own account. She had on her face something of the look that was there that day in the courtroom when she denounced the injustice of the law. She was not accustomed to being told whom she should or should not receive at her house. Her voice, quiet and well modulated, had in it nevertheless a ring of determination as she turned to Ruth and said:

"You may tell Mr. Farrar that I shall be glad to see him whenever he chooses to come."

In the excitement attendant upon this incident, none of the three had noticed the hum of an automobile in the street outside, nor that the car had stopped in front of Mrs. Bradley's house. There came a knock at her street door, and she went and opened it. Barry and Miss Chichester stood on her porch. She recovered at once from her astonishment and invited them to come in.

"Well, of all things!" exclaimed Miss Chichester,