The Transgressors. Story of a Great Sin. A Political Novel of the Twentieth Century

by Francis A. Adams

Under the new ruling, the first man to be recognized is Herman Nettinger, a man known to all the assemblage as an anarchist. He had been admitted to the councils on the supposition that the best way to pacify and placate the Anarchistic element was to offer them full representation in the work of regenerating the government.

Nettinger had been one of the few men who succeeded in eluding the police during the days of the reign of anarchy in Chicago in 1885.

He is a man of gigantic build, and of imperturbable placidity. When a soldier in the German army had provoked him to the point where he had to fight, this modern Titan had seized his tormenter and without apparent effort had dashed the man's brains out by butting him against the wall of the barracks. For this episode Nettinger had been compelled to serve eleven years in the military prison.

During these years he had familiarized himself with the teachings of the socialists, for his companions were, many of them, students of sociology. Upon his release he had come to this country. He invented a compressed air motor, but the American Motor Trust robbed him of his patents.

In the space of five minutes Nettinger strives to defend the theory of anarchy. He denounces all government as a make-shift, and asserts that man should accordingly dispense with the forms of government and depend upon animal instinct to regulate the social community. He names Samuel L. Bell, chairman of the International Patent Commission, as the man who contrived to rob him of his patent rights.

The meeting adjourns at the conclusion of this harangue.

In the hour that has passed the elements for a political revolution have been brought together and combined by a master mind.

CHAPTER X.

THE SECRET SESSION.

It is apparent that the views of the men who have the most serious grievances against the Trusts are yet to be heard. Most of the members are glad that the meeting of the previous night had adjourned so as to afford time for them to consider the salient points of the remarkable proposal that had been sprung by Nevins.