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Early in June, Penhallow on his way to meet his partners paused at McGregor's house to ask his opinion of his wife. "How do I find her? Better every day more herself. But what of you?" "Of me? I can stand it no longer, Doctor. I cannot see this war in Virginia go on to the end without taking part in it. I must do anything anything make any sacrifice." "But your wife the mills "
Seeing the look on her assailant's face and mistaking the meaning of his words she trembled and thought again of death. Reaching under the pillow on the bed she got another roll of bills and thrust that also into McGregor's hands. "Please go," she plead. "We were mistaken. We thought you were some one else." McGregor strode to the door past the man on the floor who groaned and rolled about.
At McGregor's left with his legs sprawled into the aisle sat a youth who was thinking of the yellow-haired girl and planning a campaign against her. His father was a manufacturer of berry boxes in a brick building on the West Side and he wished he were in school in another city so that it would not be necessary to live at home.
He became a student and quit the place in the apple-warehouse to the secret relief of the little bright-eyed superintendent who had never been able to get himself up to the point of raging at this big red fellow as he had raged at the German before McGregor's time.
The professor ran up and down on the platform. "I do not know what you mean," he cried nervously. McGregor turned slowly and stared at the class. He tried to explain. "Why do not men lead their lives like men?" he asked. "They must be taught to march, hundreds of thousands of men. Do you not think so?" McGregor's voice rose and his great fist was raised.
Made bold by her own boldness the woman hurried on. "I do not want you to misunderstand me," she said. "I know I can't get you. I'm not thinking of that." She began to talk of her own affairs and of the dreariness of life with her father but McGregor's mind could not centre itself on her talk.
Ormsby's reception had a half unconscious wish that such a man might be her lover. One after another Margaret brought forward the men and women of her world to couple their names with McGregor's and try to establish him in the atmosphere of assurance and ease that pervaded the house and the people.
"On the street corners downtown in the evenings and in towns and villages men talk and talk. The jaws of men are loose. They wabble about saying nothing." McGregor's excitement grew. "If there is all this unrest why does it not come to something?" he demanded. "Why do not you who have trained brains strive to find the secret of order in the midst of this disorder? Why is something not done?"
To think of anything like love, even if again it questioned her, was out of the question while before her eyes James Penhallow was fading in mind. John Penhallow was shortly relieved by McGregor's order that he should get some exercise. It enabled him to escape the early surgical visit and the diverse odours of surgical dressings which lingered in the long ward while breakfast was being served.
With a sinking heart Margaret realised that even at the height of his power the forces that would eventually destroy the impulses back of McGregor's Marchers were at work. She crept closer to David. "I love you," she said. "Some day I may have a lover but always I shall love you. I shall try to be what you want of me."
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