He obtained a position on the _Star_, a sensational, popular one-cent paper. The _Star_ was read both by the workingmen in the manufacturing plants, of whose interests it was a zealous champion, and by a large class of business men and trades-people, who found its crisp paragraphs and exaggerated, inaccurate reports of current horrors and scandals an agreeable form of excitement. Emil's employment was to make the round of the dealers in grain, lumber, wool and other staples and report trade prices and gossip, which under the control of the financial editor he was allowed to expand into commercial prognostications or advice. To the Sunday edition he began to contribute special articles exploiting the grievances of the proletariat, which the management of the _Star_ accepted and presently invited as a weekly feature. They were written with a sardonic acerbity of touch, which afforded him an outlet for his disgruntled frame of mind and free scope for his favorite theories. He also renewed his attendance at the Socialistic Club which he had frequented before his marriage, and became one of the orators there. It occurred to him that a political office would be acceptable while he was husbanding his resources. Why not become alderman on the workingman's ticket? There was a salary of five hundred dollars attached, and as a city father he would have opportunities to know what was going on in municipal affairs, and to get an inkling of some of the big schemes projected by capitalists, for the furtherance of which his vote would be required. He would be able also--and this was an exhilarating consideration--to hold the whip-hand over the arrogant moneyed men seeking franchises for next to nothing, by which to extort millions from the guileless common people. While Emil, with recovered buoyancy, readjusted his plans to meet his circumstances and set his wits to work, his wife met the necessity of strict economy with absorbed devotion. She signed the mortgage with a pang, but without hesitancy. She appreciated the necessity of the contribution. Without ready money Emil would be powerless--must become a mere clerk or subordinate, and his ambition would be crushed. She would have preferred perhaps that he should resign himself to the situation, and without imperilling their home, support his family on a modest footing by a salary or by the journalistic work for which he had an aptitude. But she recognized that his heart was set on independent success on a large scale, and that Emil thwarted or repressed would become an irritable and despondent malcontent. His shrewdness had nearly gained him a fortune, and apparently a cruel freak of chance had been solely responsible for his discomfiture. She did not pretend to criticise the nature of his business dealings. He had explained to her that capital was indispensable to the realization of his aims. She must trust him. She did suggest that he should use the proceeds of the