The One Woman
four o'clock express. They sat down in
ere written all over him. As a deacon he passed the bread and wine at the Lord's Table on Sunday, with his black eyes half closed, dreaming of cornering the bread market of the world on Monday. For him New York was the centre of the universe, and the Stock Exchange was the centre of New York
car at Long Island Ci
k with you tomorrow. Shall I
ice at two o'clock; I
answered
. The air had in it yet the cool breath of winter, but the electric thrill of coming life was in the soft breezes that came from the South, where flo
The old brick homes were crumbling and steel-ribb
but in the churches,"
seems dead
cabs, trucks and wagons. On either side towered the interminable miles of business houses whose nerves and arteries reach to the limits of the known world, savage and civilised. Behind tho
g, cursing, struggling men. And yet the earth was quivering beneath them
elow and beyond the line of towering steel and granite see the Glory of God. And as he thought how little that crowd would heed it if he did,
e, wet with tears of hope and love, or poisoned with slander and falsehood, their minarets and domes the flaming signs in the sky of a new power in history, a menace to the life of the ancient Church and its priesthood. Wa
rden where so many weary fee
tood Liberty Enlightening the World, lifting her torch among th
om the dust and proved himself a king. Home of the broken-hearted, the tyrant-cursed, t
nd ships flying the flags of every nation of the earth. His soul was flooded again with the sense of the city's imperial splendour, stretching out her han
s he turned into the narrow lane, f
ter is not far wrong in his idea
ker past. Born in New York sixty years before, he was popularly reckoned a multimillionaire, though his wealth was overestimate
d Gordon
my office. This is the first call yo
your home of
is alley is the jugular vein of the nation, and the Stock Exchange its heart. We have a President and Congress at Washington, and some very handsome buildings there. It is supposed to be the capital of the rep
r and his eyes larger as Gordo
d I've not always been fair to you as the senior of
ed over it," he
band and father. If you were to die to-morrow, your servants would stand sobbing at
y thought you wo
l and economic order. This is a question, it seems to me, we might differ about and still be friends.
tly frank?" he asked, wit
ay anything that would anger
h, you don't preach
preach the gos
e strike amongst the
of the richest men
, finding their own thread and using their own machines. I said if I found one of those shirts in my house I'd put it in the f
ftly stroked
d $500 a year to the church. He has gone whe
never touch his life," Gordon said with a sneer. "What's the use to
n't like the idea that man
cholarship susta
it's true, the less sa
ck dignity out
I ever saw was a dead man-a dead New Yo
rted from the fait
e, "if you mean our famous fathers who 'landed f
ignored
masses and the asses. That sentence cost the church a thousa
it's
if it were, it don't
preach the tru
preach the simple
ch I could best give my message to the world. I answer to God, not to you. The salary you pay
system, as old as our life, and allow a mob of strange
ing pews un-Christian and imm
ittle crazy. Even your best friend
d Chri
clouded and his
"Deacon, you have allowed your commercial habits to master your thinking, your religion and your character. In your home, you are a good man. I
a pastor and deacon, t
away who preceded me
nced at this acknowl
ow for New York. Yo
ood-naturedly on the shining
will have to
. My kindest regar