"No!" came in a great and indignant chorus.
"I used to be!" defiantly asserted the young man with the spectacles and the pale face and the beaten look.
"And now?"
"Just a lame duck, I guess."
"Too much rumatism," suggested a husky voice, and all the others laughed. The depths of degradation are reached when you can laugh at your own degradation.
"Are any of you socialists?" asked Hendrik.
They looked at him doubtfully. They wished to please him and would have answered accordingly if they had known what he wished to get from them. What they wished to get from him, in the way of speech, was another invitation to tank up. But when in doubt, all men deny. It is good police-court practice. Three veterans, therefore, tentatively said:
"No!"
Hendrik was disappointed, but did not show it. He asked, "Are any of you Christians?"
The crowd fell back.