Page:O'Higgins--From the life.djvu/331

 "And yet," Harris retorted, "you admit, I suppose, that there may be such a thing as 'honest poverty'?"

Wickson wheeled on him. "I'll go farther. I'll admit that there may be such a thing as honest wealth."

Harris spread his hands. "I don't wish to think," he said, "that you've lost your faith in the spiritualities. I don't wish to believe that you've become wholly a materialist. God has manifested Himself in your work." And Harris could say these things without any trace of cant, in a voice full of conviction. "You've been a great power for good, but in struggling against the evils of this world I think you're forgetting to rely on the saving grace that can alone work the miracle of regeneration in the soul of evil."

"I know." Wickson sighed. "I know. You're sincere. You believe it. There's no use in arguing."

"There is nothing to argue," Harris said, pontifically. "It is so."

Wickson ran his hand through his hair—a rough shock of hair that had grown sparse in a dry tangle. He sat down again at his desk. "Well," he said, "they don't think I can be re-elected, eh? They tell you 'the boys' won't vote for me—the rank and file. I've made too many enemies. Some of our own friends don't like my remarks about the connection between street-railway franchises and protected vice. Bill Toole—and it comes, I sup-