"Can you do that sort of thing and not become that sort of thing?"
"Ask Edmonds," said Banneker.
"Thirty years I've been in this business," said the veteran slowly. "I
suppose there are few of its problems and perplexities that I haven't
been up against. And I tell you, Miss Van Arsdale, all this froth and
noise and sensationalism doesn't matter. It's an offense to taste, I
know. But back of it is the big thing that we're trying to do; to enlist
the ignorant and helpless and teach them to be less ignorant and
helpless. If fostering the political ambitions of a Marrineal is part of
the price, why, I'm willing to pay it, so long as the paper keeps
straight and doesn't sell itself for bribe money. After all, Marrineal
can ride to his goal only on our chariot. The Patriot is an institution
now. You can't alter an institution, not essentially. You get committed
to it, to the thing you've made yourself. Ban and I have made the new
Patriot, not Marrineal. Even if he got rid of us, he couldn't change the
paper; not for a long time and only very gradually. The following that
we've built up would be too strong for him."
"Isn't it too strong for you two?" asked the doubting woman-soul.
"No. We understand it because we made it."
"Frankenstein once said something like that," she murmured.
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