"Well," said the other, "All you need do is to write a few lines over your signature, stating that you have been misquoted and to quit making Democratic speeches, and the Republicans will give you anything you want and settle the wage question, besides." McLuckie's eyes blazed and his big fist came down on the table with a bang. "So," he said, "you want me not only to sacrifice my independence, but to write myself down a PUBLIC LIAR! If any other man made such a proposal to me, Hugh, I would knock him down." "Don't be unreasonable, John," the Master Workman argued. "Remember what is at stake. Remember that it is in your hands to stop misery and bloodshed and restore happiness to Homestead." "Yes, at the price of my own character," rejoined the big Burgess, hotly. "Say no more, Hugh. Come what may, I shall never denounce myself to the American people as a liar and a hypocrite." Here the conversation ended and the two men left the hotel. Just then Hugh O'Donnell came out of a hotel across the street, and seeing McLuckie and Dempsey hastened to join them. "What do you think he has been asking me to do?" said McLuckie, with a contemptuous glance at Dempsey, and then he recounted the interview at the hotel. O'Donnell laughed. "Why, John," he said, "it was I that asked Dempsey to talk to you. If you are as sensible a man as I take you to be, and are anxious to render real service to your friends here, you will do as the National Committee wants you to, and you'll never regret it." McLuckie answered with bitterness that O'Donnell was mistaken in him, that his manhood was not for sale to the politicians, and that he would treat as an enemy any man who met him with proposals the acceptance of which would place him in a dubious light before the American people. The endeavor to silence McLuckie and make him recant did not end here. The Burgess was warned by members of the Advisory Board that his anti-tariff talks were damaging the cause of the strikers; nevertheless he declined to put a bridle on his tongue and let slip no opportunity of speaking on the text, "Protection for the manufacturer and free trade in labor," with incidental references to the connection between high tariff, high fences and Pinkerton thugs.