“Very well.” And Ryder pulled in his legs and rose slowly from his chair. “If you can't and won't see it as I do it's your lookout.” Oakley laughed, shortly. “I guess I'll be able to meet the situation, Mr. Ryder.” “Perhaps you will, and perhaps you won't. We'll see about that when the time comes.” “You heard what I said about the M. & W.?” “Well, what about that?” “You understand what it means--the closing of the shops?” “Oh, I guess that's a long ways off.” He stalked over to the door with his head in the air. He was mad clear through. At the door he turned. Hoadley's retention meant more to him than he would have admitted. It was not that he cared a rap for Hoadley. On the contrary, he detested him, but the fellow was a power in country politics. “If you should think better of it--” and he was conscious his manner was weak with the weakness of the man who has asked and failed. “I sha'n't,” retorted Oakley, laconically. He scouted the idea that Ryder, with his little country newspaper could either help or harm him. CHAPTER VIII ROGER OAKLEY had gone to work in the car-shops the day following his arrival in Antioch. Dan had sought to dissuade him, but he was stubbornness itself, and the latter realized that the only thing to do was to let him alone, and not seek to control him. After all, if he would be happier at work, it was no one's affair but his own. It never occurred to the old convict that pride might have to do with the stand Dan took in the matter. He was wonderfully gentle and affectionate, with a quaint, unworldly simplicity that was rather pathetic. His one anxiety was to please Dan, but, in spite of this anxiety, once a conviction took possession of him he clung to it with unshaken tenacity in the face of every argument his son could bring to bear. Under the inspiration of his newly acquired freedom, he developed in unexpected ways. As soon as he felt that his place in the shops was secure and that he was not to be interfered with, he joined the Methodist Church. Its services occupied most of his spare time. Every Thursday night found him at prayer-meeting. Twice each Sunday he went to church, and by missing his dinner he managed to take part in the Sunday-school exercises. A social threw him into a flutter of pleased expectancy. Not content with what his church offered, irrespective of creed, he joined every society in the place of a religious or temperance nature, and was a zealous and active worker among such of the heathen as flourished in Antioch. There was a stern Old Testament flavor to his faith. He would have dragged the erring from their peril by main strength, and have regulated their morals by legal enactments. Those of the men with whom he came in contact in the shops treated him with the utmost respect, partly on his own account, and partly because of Dan.