"What would you suggest?" inquired the rector, rather crestfallen.
"I'd suggest training men as officers. And then--a draft."
"Never come to it in the world." Hutchinson spoke up. "I've heard men in
the mill talking. They'll go, some of them, but they won't be driven. It
would be civil war."
Clayton glanced at Graham as he replied. The boy was leaning forward,
listening.
"There's this to be said for the draft," he said. "Under the volunteer
system the best of our boys will go first. That's what happened in
England. And they were wiped out. It's every man's war now. There is no
reason why the few should be sacrificed for the many."
"And there's this, too," Graham broke in. He was flushed and nervous.
"A fellow would have to go. He wouldn't be having to think whether his
going would hurt anybody or not. He wouldn't have to decide. He'd--just
go."
There was a little hush in the room. Then Nolan spoke.
"Right-o!" he said. "The only trouble about it is that it's likely to
leave out some of us old chaps, who'd like to have a fist in it."
Hutchinson remained after the others had gone. He wanted to discuss the
change in status of the plant.
"We'll be taken over by the government, probably," Clayton told him.
"They have all the figures, capacity and so on. The Ordnance Department
has that in hand."
Hutchinson nodded. He had himself made the report.
"We'll have to look out more than ever, I suppose," he said, as he rose
to go. "The government is guarding all bridges and railways already. Met
a lot of National Guard boys on the way."
Graham left when he did, offering to take him to his home, and Clayton
sat for some time alone, smoking and thinking. So the thing had come at
last. A year from now, and where would they all be? The men who had been
there to-night, himself, Graham? Would they all be even living? Would
Graham--?
He looked back over the years. Graham a baby, splashing water in his
bath and shrieking aloud with joy; Graham in his first little-boy
clothes, riding a velocipede in the park and bringing in bruises of an
amazing size and blackness; Graham going away to school, and manfully
fixing his mind on his first long trousers, so he would not cry;
Graham at college, coming in with the winning crew, and stumbling, half
collapsed, into the arms of a waiting, cheering crowd. And the Graham
who had followed his mother up the stairs that night, to come down
baffled, thwarted, miserable.