Black Tom glanced at the desk clock, frowned and said shortly:
"I suppose that means you want to look us over with a view to coming in?"
"I don't know whether I do or not," Roger flung at him.
Black Tom seemed to see him for the first time. He smiled and sat down.
"I beg your pardon, but we get pretty gruff in this thing. So you've left Wainwright? Consequential ass. What do you want to do?"
"Anything that will stop the output of more—consequential asses."
Black Tom leaned back in his chair and laughed, a laugh so deep and eternally young, that Roger knew the man could never seriously annoy him again.
"You've come to the right place. That's our specialty," and added, "any party affiliations?"
Roger shook his head. "Not yet."
"That's all right. Don't—till you're ready. When your faith needs to sign itself to some register, do it. Right Wing, Left Wing Socialist, Syndicalist, Communist, I. W. W., they're all headed right and there's something the matter with them all. It doesn't matter really; start a new party if you like. Names, names," he added, a little wearily, "all names for the same thing—the new world that's struggling to be born. Science, art, religion, politics, we're all fighting for the same end—to root out the dead old forms, give new growths a chance. We're all beating in our different ways toward the same thing—Understanding, Beauty, Unity. One fits in where he can." He looked across the dirty loft to a group of men waiting for him on the bench where Roger had sat a few moments before. "This is mine. I had no special training, nothing but physical strength and longing." His gaze came back to his own hands, broken and sparsely covered at the wrists and knuckles with stiff black hair. "I worked in a Pennsylvania coal mine when I was twelve. I read at night. When I was nineteen I went for a while to night-school with kids thirteen and fourteen. I never had three square meals a day until I was twenty-three. I lived in mines and shops and libraries."