The others were discussing the matter,and seemed not to have noticed Lindau,who controlled himself and sighed:"You are right.I must have patience."Beaton was saying to Dryfoos,"Pity your Pinkertons couldn't have given them a few shots before they left.""No,that wasn't necessary,"said Dryfoos."I succeeded in breaking up the union.I entered into an agreement with other parties not to employ any man who would not swear that he was non-union.If they had attempted violence,of course they could have been shot.But there was no fear of that.Those fellows can always be depended upon to cut one another's throats in the long run.""But sometimes,"said Colonel Woodburn,who had been watching throughout.
for a chance to mount his hobby again,"they make a good deal of trouble first.How was it in the great railroad strike of '77?""Well,I guess there was a little trouble that time,colonel,"said Fulkerson."But the men that undertake to override the laws and paralyze the industries of a country like this generally get left in the end.""Yes,sir,generally;and up to a certain point,always.But it's the exceptional that is apt to happen,as well as the unexpected.And a little reflection will convince any gentleman here that there is always a danger of the exceptional in your system.The fact is,those fellows have the game in their own hands already.A strike of the whole body of the Brotherhood of Engineers alone would starve out the entire Atlantic seaboard in a week;labor insurrection could make head at a dozen given points,and your government couldn't move a man over the roads without the help of the engineers.""That is so,"said Kendrick,struck by the dramatic character of the conjecture.He imagined a fiction dealing with the situation as something already accomplished.
"Why don't some fellow do the Battle of Dorking act with that thing?"said Fulkerson."It would be a card."
"Exactly what I was thinking,Mr.Fulkerson,"said Kendricks.
Fulkerson laughed."Telepathy--clear case of mind transference.Better see March,here,about it.I'd like to have it in 'Every Other Week.'
It would make talk."
"Perhaps it might set your people to thinking as well as talking,"said the colonel.
"Well,sir,"said Dryfoos,setting his lips so tightly together that his imperial stuck straight outward,"if I had my way,there wouldn't be any Brotherhood of Engineers,nor any other kind of labor union in the whole country.""What!"shouted Lindau."You would sobbress the unionss of the voarking-men?"
"Yes,I would."
"And what would you do with the unionss of the gabidalists--the drosts--and gompines,and boolss?Would you dake the righdt from one and gif it to the odder?""Yes,sir,I would,"said Dryfoos,with a wicked look at him.
Lindau was about to roar back at him with some furious protest,but March put his hand on his shoulder imploringly,and Lindau turned to him to say in German:"But it is infamous--infamous!What kind of man is this?Who is he?He has the heart of a tyrant."Colonel Woodburn cut in."You couldn't do that,Mr.Dryfoos,under your system.And if you attempted it,with your conspiracy laws,and that kind of thing,it might bring the climax sooner than you expected.Your commercialized society has built its house on the sands.It will have to go.But I should be sorry if it went before its time.""You are righdt,sir,"said Lindau."It would be a bity.I hobe it will last till it feelss its rottenness,like Herodt.Boat,when its hour gomes,when it trope to bieces with the veight off its own gorrubtion--what then?"
"It's not to be supposed that a system of things like this can drop to pieces of its own accord,like the old Republic of Venice,"said the colonel."But when the last vestige of commercial society is gone,then we can begin to build anew;and we shall build upon the central idea,not of the false liberty you now worship,but of responsibility--responsibility.The enlightened,the moneyed,the cultivated class shall be responsible to the central authority--emperor,duke,president;the name does not matter--for the national expense and the national defence,and it shall be responsible to the working-classes of all kinds for homes and lands and implements,and the opportunity to labor at all times.
The working-classes shall be responsible to the leisure class for the support of its dignity in peace,and shall be subject to its command in war.The rich shall warrant the poor against planless production and the ruin that now follows,against danger from without and famine from within,and the poor--""No,no,no!"shouted Lindau."The State shall do that--the whole beople.The men who voark shall have and shall eat;and the men that will not voark,they shall sdarfe.But no man need sdarfe.He will go to the State,and the State will see that he haf voark,and that he haf foodt.All the roadts and mills and mines and landts shall be the beople's and be ron by the beople for the beople.There shall be no rich and no boor;and there shall not be war any more,for what bower wouldt dare to addack a beople bound togeder in a broderhood like that?""Lion and lamb act,"said Fulkerson,not well knowing,after so much champagne,what words he was using.
No one noticed him,and Colonel Woodburn said coldly to Lindau,"You are talking paternalism,sir.""And you are dalking feutalism!"retorted the old man.
The colonel did not reply.A silence ensued,which no one broke till Fulkerson said:"Well,now,look here.If either one of these millenniums was brought about,by force of arms,or otherwise,what would become of 'Every Other Week'?Who would want March for an editor?How would Beaton sell his pictures?Who would print Mr.Kendricks's little society verses and short stories?What would become of Conrad and his good works?"Those named grinned in support of Fulkerson's diversion,but Lindau and the colonel did not speak;Dryfoos looked down at his plate,frowning.
