"Isn't the price we pay too great? Is his labor worth more than the purity of our racial stock? Shall we improve the breed of men or degrade it? Is any progress that degrades the breed of men progress at all? Is it not retrogression? Can we afford it?"
He threw off his train of thought with a gesture of weariness and a great desire suddenly possessed his heart to get rid of such a burden by a complete break with every tie of life save one.
"Why not take the boy and go?" he exclaimed.
The more he turned the idea over in his mind the more clearly it seemed to be the sensible thing to do.
But the fighting instinct within him was too strong for immediate surrender. He went to his office determined to work and lose himself in a return to its old habits.
He sat down at his desk, but his mind was a blank. There wasn't a question on earth that seemed worth writing an editorial about. Nothing mattered.
For two hours he sat hopelessly staring at his exchanges. The same world, which he had left a few weeks before when he had gone down into the valley of the shadows to fight for his life, still rolled on with its endless story of joy and sorrow, ambitions and struggle. It seemed now the record of the buzzing of a lot of insects. It was a waste of time to record such a struggle or to worry one way or another about it. And this effort of a daily newspaper to write the day's history of these insects! It might be worth the while of a philosopher to pause a moment to record the blow that would wipe them out of existence, but to get excited again over their little squabbles—it seemed funny now that he had ever been such a fool!
He rose at last in disgust and seized his hat to go home when the Chairman of the Executive Committee of his party suddenly walked into his office unannounced. His face was wreathed in smiles and his deep bass voice had a hearty, genuine ring:
"I've big news for you, major!"
The editor placed a chair beside his desk, motioned his visitor to be seated and quietly resumed his seat.