“Do you know the nickname of this paper?”

“Yes.  My father told me of it.”

“It was his set that pinned it on us.  ‘The Daily Carrion,’ they call us, and they said that our triumphal roosters ought to be vultures.  Do you know why?”

“In plain English because of the paper’s lies and blackguardism.”

“In plainer English, because of its truth.  Wait a minute, now.  I’m not saying that the ‘Clarion’ doesn’t lie.  All papers do, I guess.  They have to.  But it’s when we’ve cut loose on straight facts that we’ve got in wrong.”

“Give me an instance.”

“Well, the sewing-girls’ strike.”

“Engineered by a crooked labor leader and a notoriety-seeking woman.”

“I see the bunch have got to you already, and have filled you up with their dope.  Never mind that, now.  We’re supposed to be a sort of tribune of the common people.  Rights of the ordinary citizen, and that sort of thing.  So we took up the strike and printed the news pretty straight.  No other paper touched it.”

“Why not?”

“Didn’t dare.  We had to drop it, ourselves.  Not until we’d lost ten thousand dollars in advertising, though, and gained an extra blot on our reputation as being socialistic and an enemy to capital and all that kind of rot.”

“Wasn’t it simply a case of currying favor with the working-classes?”

“According as you look at it.”  Apparently weary of looking at it at all, McGuire Ellis tipped back in his chair and contemplated the ceiling.  When he spoke his voice floated up as softly as a ring of smoke.  “How honest are you going to be, Mr. Surtaine?”

“What!”

“I asked you how honest you are going to be.”

“It’s a question I don’t think you need to ask me.”

“I do.  How else will I find out?”

“I intend the ‘Clarion’ to be strictly and absolutely honest.  That’s all there is to that.”

“Don’t be so young,” said McGuire Ellis wearily. “’Strictly and absol’—­see here, did you ever read ’The Wrecker’?”

“More than once.”

“Remember the chap who says, ’You seem to think honesty as simple as blindman’s-buff.  I don’t.  It’s some difference of definition, I suppose’?  Now, there’s meat in that.”

“Difference of definition be hanged.  Honesty is honesty.”

“And policy is policy.  And bankruptcy is bankruptcy.”

“I don’t see the connection.”

“It’s there.  Honesty for a newspaper isn’t just a matter of good intentions.  It’s a matter of eternal watchfulness and care and expert figuring-out of things.”

“You mean that we’re likely to make mistakes about facts—­”

“We’re certain to.  But that isn’t what I mean at all.  I mean that it’s harder for a newspaper to be honest than it is for the pastor of a rich church.”

“You can’t make me believe that.”

“Facts can.  But I’m not doing my job.  You want to learn the details of the business, and I’m wasting time trying to throw light into the deep places where it keeps what it has of conscience.  That’ll come later.  Now where shall I begin?”