"Think again, old man."
"I've thought, Raney. Politics, society, journalism——" The thought of Erckmann and the 'Ruban Bleu,' the memory of Sir John Woburn and the Press Combine, choked me.
"There's a world outside London, old man," he said. "It's a large thing you're condemning—the order of an empire where there's more personal liberty, freedom of speech and thought and even-handed justice than anywhere in creation. A race of degenerates seldom rules for long, and, if it's the virtues of individuality that make our rule possible, you must expect the vices of individuality to appear and drop their pebbles into the wheels of the machine."
Again we walked on until the stable clock struck one. O'Rane looked at his watch in surprise.
"I'd had no idea it was so late," he said. "I've been thinking—like you."
"Or Jim, or Val Arden," I put in.
"Yes, and—like you—I'm depressed. Things move so slowly, George. I've been so busy with my own affairs that I've hardly been near the House since I was elected, and now there's likely to be war, and when that's over I shall have to start again at the bottom. And there was a lot I was in a hurry to do," he added regretfully.
"What can you do with our social and political machine?" I demanded.
"It's made up of human parts," he answered, with a smile, "and every human being has ears and a heart. In time I can make people listen to me and, when they listen, I can do what I like with them."
"I thought that before I made my first speech. You've not been broken by the House of Commons yet, Raney."