"Give 'em hell, boy. You've got the idea. Let's get out of this place. It stinks." Potter had been unfair, but he did not know he had been unfair. Those men meant better than they had spoken, and their intentions were good. They had not comprehended yet, that was all--not the greater part of them. But already there was a growing, silent minority who looked ahead and saw--a minority which was getting ready mentally, and which, with an avalanche from the majority, would one day stand up to its duty as Americans with love of America in their hearts.... The time was not distant, for events were lunging forward. Potter and his friend walked out of the room and into the street. "They'll say some nasty things about you, Waite," said the big man, "and rake up old scrapes. Don't let it worry you. Stick to the gait you've struck. You're tackling a big job, and I like the way you go at it." "Aeroplanes--" Potter said, quickly. But the big man interrupted: "Now, now, keep off me. I know about your aeroplanes. You don't have to convert me.... How's it coming, if it's allowed to ask?" "Delays and delays. The steel-mills are delayed by the mines; the machine-works are delayed by the steel-mills; the whole of them are messed up by labor shortage, and when they get a machine ready for delivery the railroads catch it in an embargo or run it on a side-track and forget it. But we're making progress. Maybe by November we'll get down to brass tacks. If we can only get the necessary machinery for quantity production installed.... I don't think we're as bad off as the people who will assemble the 'planes. They're up against it for spruce and linen." "If there's ever anything I can do--I've offered my entire plant to the government, but can't get any satisfaction. Meantime I'm manufacturing army trucks day and night." "If only that herd--" Potter began, angrily. "They'll come along, Waite. You'll see. They've traveled quite a distance since April sixth." Potter got into his car and drove away. He was seething. His mind was in a tumult, for the noon's events had excited him, and for months he had been under a strain which was beginning to wear the insulation off his nerves. He lived in a fever; drove himself and everybody else feverishly. At last the energy which had made his youth fertile for the sensational press was finding an outlet, and the burning urge of his restless soul was compelling him to a headlong pace that permitted no rest, no conservation of powers. He was a man driven.