This was all satisfactory; but MacKellar added a bit of information of desperate import--the officers of the union declared that they could not support a strike at the present time! It was premature, it could lead to nothing but failure and discouragement to the larger movement they were planning. Such a possibility Hal had himself realised at the outset. But he had witnessed the new birth of freedom at North Valley, he had seen the hungry, toil-worn faces of men looking up to him for support; he had been moved by it, and had come to feel that the union officials must be moved in the same way. “They’ve simply got to back it!” he exclaimed. “Those men must not be disappointed! They’ll lose all hope, they’ll sink into utter despair! The labour men must realise that--I must make them!” The old Scotchman answered that Minetti had felt the same way. He had flung caution to the winds, and rushed over to the hotel to see Hartman and Moylan. Hal decided to follow, and went out to the automobile. He explained matters to his brother, whose comment was, Of course! It was what he had foretold. The poor, mis-guided miners would go back to their work, and their would-be leader would have to admit the folly of his course. There was a train for Western City in a couple of hours; it would be a great favour if Hal would arrange to take it. Hal answered shortly that he was going to the American Hotel. His brother might take him there, if he chose. So Edward gave the order to the driver of the car. Incidentally, Edward began asking about clothing-stores in Pedro. While Hal was in the hotel, pleading for the life of his newly-born labour union, Edward would seek a costume in which he could “feel like a human being.” SECTION 19. Hal found Jerry Minetti with the two officials in their hotel-room: Jim Moylan, district secretary, a long, towering Irish boy, black-eyed and black-haired, quick and sensitive, the sort of person one trusted and liked at the first moment; and Johann Hartman, local president, a grey-haired miner of German birth, reserved and slow-spoken, evidently a man of much strength, both physical and moral. He had need of it, any one could realise, having charge of a union headquarters in the heart of this “Empire of Raymond”! Hal first told of the kidnapping of the committee. This did not surprise the officials, he found; it was the thing the companies regularly did when there was threat of rebellion in the camps. That was why efforts to organise openly were so utterly hopeless. There was no chance for anything but a secret propaganda, maintained until every camp had the nucleus of an organisation. “So you can’t back this strike!” exclaimed Hal. Not possibly, was Moylan’s reply. It would be lost as soon as it was begun. There was no slightest hope of success until a lot of organisation work had been done. “But meantime,” argued Hal, “the union at North Valley will go to pieces!”