His complex anger flamed afresh, and Ruth was in terror of him.  Never had she seen him so angry, and it was all mystified and unreasonable to her comprehension.  And yet, through her very terror ran the fibres of fascination that had drawn and that still drew her to him—­that had compelled her to lean towards him, and, in that mad, culminating moment, lay her hands upon his neck.  She was hurt and outraged by what had taken place, and yet she lay in his arms and quivered while he went on muttering, “The beasts!  The beasts!” And she still lay there when he said:  “I’ll not bother your table again, dear.  They do not like me, and it is wrong of me to thrust my objectionable presence upon them.  Besides, they are just as objectionable to me.  Faugh!  They are sickening.  And to think of it, I dreamed in my innocence that the persons who sat in the high places, who lived in fine houses and had educations and bank accounts, were worth while!”

CHAPTER XXXVIII

“Come on, let’s go down to the local.”

So spoke Brissenden, faint from a hemorrhage of half an hour before—­the second hemorrhage in three days.  The perennial whiskey glass was in his hands, and he drained it with shaking fingers.

“What do I want with socialism?” Martin demanded.

“Outsiders are allowed five-minute speeches,” the sick man urged.  “Get up and spout.  Tell them why you don’t want socialism.  Tell them what you think about them and their ghetto ethics.  Slam Nietzsche into them and get walloped for your pains.  Make a scrap of it.  It will do them good.  Discussion is what they want, and what you want, too.  You see, I’d like to see you a socialist before I’m gone.  It will give you a sanction for your existence.  It is the one thing that will save you in the time of disappointment that is coming to you.”

“I never can puzzle out why you, of all men, are a socialist,” Martin pondered.  “You detest the crowd so.  Surely there is nothing in the canaille to recommend it to your aesthetic soul.”  He pointed an accusing finger at the whiskey glass which the other was refilling.  “Socialism doesn’t seem to save you.”

“I’m very sick,” was the answer.  “With you it is different.  You have health and much to live for, and you must be handcuffed to life somehow.  As for me, you wonder why I am a socialist.  I’ll tell you.  It is because Socialism is inevitable; because the present rotten and irrational system cannot endure; because the day is past for your man on horseback.  The slaves won’t stand for it.  They are too many, and willy-nilly they’ll drag down the would-be equestrian before ever he gets astride.  You can’t get away from them, and you’ll have to swallow the whole slave-morality.  It’s not a nice mess, I’ll allow.  But it’s been a-brewing and swallow it you must.  You are antediluvian anyway, with your Nietzsche ideas.