Yes, everything and nothing. Christ Perko's rich, Christ Perko runs this house, The madam merely acts as figure-head; Keeps check upon the girls and on the wine. She's just the editor, and yet I'd rather Be editor than owner. I was editor. My Perko was the owner of a pulp mill, Incorporate through some multi-millionaires, And all our lesser writers were the girls, Like you and Rachel. FLORENCE But you know before He married Rachel, he was lover to The madam here. JACK The stories tally, for The pulp mill took my first assistant editor To wife by making him the editor. And I was fired just as the madam here Lost out with Perko. FLORENCE This is growing funny... Ahem! I'll ask you something-- As if I were a youth and you a girl-- How were you ruined first? JACK The same as you: You ran away from school. It was romance. You thought you loved this flashy travelling man. And I--I loved adventure, loved the truth. I wanted to destroy the force called "They." There is no "They"--we're all together here, And everyone must live, Christ Perko too, The pulp-mill, the policeman, magistrate, The alderman, the precinct captain too, And you the girls, myself the editor, And all the lesser writers. Here we are Thrown in one integrated lot. You see There is no "They," except the terms, the thought Which ramifies and vivifies the whole. ... So I came to the city, went to work Reporting for a paper. Having said There is no "They"--I've freed myself to say What bitter things I choose. For how they drive you, And terrify you, mock you, ridicule you, And call you cub and greenhorn, send you round To courts and dirty places, make you risk Your body and your life, and make you watch The rules about your writing; what's tabooed, What names are to be cursed or to be praised, What interests, policies to be subserved, And what to undermine. So I went through, Until I had a desk, wrote editorials-- Now said I to myself, I'm free at last. But no, my manager, your madam, mark you, Kept eye on me, for he was under watch Of some Christ Perko. So my manager Blue penciled me when I touched certain subjects. But, as he was a just man, loved me too. He gave me things to write where he could let My conscience have full scope, as you might live In this house where you saw the man you loved, And no one else, though living in this hell. For I lived in a hell, who saw around me Such lying, hatred, malice, prostitution. And when this offer came to be an editor