* * * * * On the heels of the influenza epidemic, and possibly produced by it, came a period of labour unrest in the Area. It was only what I had always anticipated; for the strain which we were putting upon the workers had now increased almost to the breaking point. There was no way out of the difficulty, however; for unless the work was done, the safety of the whole community would be imperilled. None the less, I could not help finding excuses in my mind for those toiling millions. To them, the connection between the factories and the food-supply must have been difficult to trace; for they could hardly follow all the ramifications in the lines between the coal in the pits and the next harvest which was not even sown. Nordenholt succeeded in stifling most of the disaffection by means of a fresh newspaper campaign of propaganda. He had given his journals a long period of rest in this direction, purposely, I believe, in order that he might utilise them more effectively when this new emergency arose. But though he certainly produced a marked effect by his efforts, there remained among the workers an under-current of discontent which could not be exorcised. It was not a case of open disaffection which could have been dealt with by drastic methods; the Intelligence section were unable to fasten upon any clear cases of what in the old days would have been called sedition. It was rather a change for the worse in the general attitude and outlook of the labouring part of the community: an affair of atmosphere which left nothing solid for Nordenholt to grasp firmly. Though I was out of direct touch with affairs at the time, even I could not help the feeling that things were out of joint. The demeanour of the workers in the streets was somehow different from what it had been in the earlier days. There was a sullenness and a tinge of aggressiveness in the air. And in Nordenholt himself I noticed a corresponding change. He seemed to me by degrees to be losing his impersonal standpoint. The new situation appeared to be making him more and more dictatorial as time went by. He had always acted as a Dictator; but in his personal contact with men he had preserved an attitude of aloofness and certainty which had taken the edge off the Dictatorship. Now, I noticed, his methods were becoming more direct; and he was making certain test-points into trials of strength, open and avowed, between himself and those who opposed him. He always won, of course; but it was a different state of things from that which had marked the inception of the Nitrogen Area. There was more of the master and less of the comrade about him now.