The next day the occurrence at the armory the night before was the talk of the town. The newspapers took the matter up and exploited it from one end of the State to the other. Sergeant Barriscale was commended for his prompt and vigorous action in ridding the armory of an avowed enemy to the government, while Sergeant McCormack received due credit for his soldierly obedience, under most embarrassing circumstances. But Sergeant McCormack’s anger at the humiliation that had been put upon him was not appeased by any commendation of his soldierly conduct. Slow to wrath as he had always been, he was now thoroughly aroused and intensely indignant. If he could have withdrawn from the company and so severed the only relations between him and Barriscale, he would have done so at once. But it is not within the province of an enlisted man to resign, and he had no legitimate excuse for applying for a discharge, so nothing happened. But the breach that had opened narrowly between the two boys at the time of the flag-raising, and that had broadened dangerously on the night Chick was ordered from the stack-room, and had yawned wide, deep and impassable, since the night of the company meeting, was apparently never to be closed. Hal was still employed at the Citizens’ Bank. He had been promoted from one position to another until he had come now to be regarded as one of the most trusted and skilful employees of that institution. Only one shadow rested on his standing there, and that was cast by his open espousal of the cause of the discontented in society, and his association with the more radical elements in the city. He had not been accused of planning the destruction of the existing social order, nor of advocating the confiscation of the property of the rich. He was a student and a dreamer rather than a militant reformer. But his well-known attitude was bound to cast upon him the shadow of suspicion; and since the occurrence of the incident at the armory, and its wide exploitation, the shadow had deepened into a cloud, and more than one whispered accusation went forth against him, of disloyalty to the forces that had made this country great and prosperous, and of indifference to the flag which was a symbol of power and progress, and so regarded the world over. Moreover, for nearly a year, Europe had been weltering in the bloodiest war of history. No one could tell how soon the red waves of it would break on the shores of the United States. It was a time when absolute loyalty was expected and demanded from every man who had the welfare of his country and of his fellow-citizens at heart. Had it not been that McCormack’s social heresies were leavened to an appreciable extent by his apparent devotion to the National Guard, he would doubtless have found himself criticized more severely, and ostracized more effectually, than he had thus far been.