THE OPPERMANNS phone into this room. If anybody rings, 1'11 open the door myself. Take the car if you like." "Thank you, Herr Doctor," said Schlüter. Gustav told Franccis what had occurred. Schlüter's brother- in-law, a certain Pachnicke, a mechanic by trade, adecent fellow who took no interest in politics, had witnessed one of the daily scuffies between Republicans and the mercenaries of the Nationalist party. During the scufHe one of the Republi- cans was killed. The Nationalists declared that they had acted in self-defence, having first been attacked by the Republicans. It was the usual defence offered by the adherents of the Na- tionalists after they had assaulted and killed an opponent. Dur- ing the prosecution of the mercenary who had shot the Repub- lican, the mechanie Pachnieke had been ealled as a witness and had stated, with truth, that the swastika men had begun the scufile. His statement, together with those of all the others who had sworn to the same efIect, was not, however, believed, and the mereenary was discharged. But Pachnicke hirnself, shortly after the ease, had been assaulted by some swastika men at night and so roughly handled that he had to be taken to the elinie. "You see, my dear Oppermann," said Francois, after Gustav had ended his tale, "it is not exactly an easy thing for a man to practise truth and reason in this Germany of ours. Perhaps you will not judge me so harshly for wanting to protect your nephew from the fate of the mechanic Pachnicke." "You are generalizing unfairly, my dear Francois," returned Gustav rather heatedly. "After all neither you, your staff, nor the gen- tlemen at the Ministry of Edueation are mercenaries. No, no, The great majority of Germans are men like Pachnicke, not swastika men. With all their money and soft-soap promises they have been able to take in searcely a third of the popula- tion. After so much costly effort it is all astonishingly meagre result. No, my dear Francois, the people are sound at heart,"

BOOK ONE: YESTERDAY "Tell me that often and as emphatically as you can," re- turned Franccis. "It is important for us to believe it. But I don't always find it easy to believe. And now, if you will per- mit me, let us drop the subject. I can still, even now, fee1 the taste that vile book has left in my mouth. Let's rinse it out with something good." He rummaged among the books, and took out a volume of Goethe. He read, smiling: " 'In times of disorder the masses throw themselves from side to side like a man in a fever.'" They washed their souls clean from the reading of the "Protocols" and the book entitled My Battle. They spent two pleasant hours together. Their uneasiness vanished. A nation which had concerned itself for centuries so intensively with books, such as those they saw around them, could never allow itself to be deceived by the nonsense in the "Protocols" and the book entitled My Battle. It had been an excess of caution wh ich had caused Gustav to follow Mühl- heim's advice, and Franccis had no reason to regard the issue of the Vogelsang case with any doubt. Gustav had been quite right. The average citizens of the nation were men like the mechanic Pachnicke, who did not belong to the rabble that admired the mercenaries. They remembered the dying man's phrase: "Even if I were sure that all this would happen to me again, I would still give the same evidence." That was the way such people thought, not Herr Vogelsang's way. They stuck to reason, they were not taken in by the hackneyed rhetoric of the Leader. Cheerfully, content, and confident of the future, they jested about the probable fate of the Leader, whether he would end as a barker of a fair or as an insurance agent.