Children of the rich -- Fiction; Industrial relations -- Fiction; Married people -- Fiction
"May I take him along, Lieutenant? I'll fix it with the judge if
necessary.... And say, happen to recognize him?"
"Never saw him before."
"If any of the newspaper boys come snoopin' around, you never saw me,
either. Much obliged, Lieutenant."
"You're welcome, Mr. Lightener. Glad I kin accommodate you."
Lightener pushed Bonbright into his limousine. "You don't want to go
home, I guess. We'll go to my house. Mother'll see you get breakfast.
... Then we'll have a talk.... Here's a paper boy; let's see what's
doing."
It was the morning penny paper that Lightener bought, the paper with
leanings toward the proletariat, the veiled champion of labor. He
bought it daily.
"Huh!" he grunted, as he scanned the first page. "They kind of allude
to you."
Bonbright looked. He saw a two-column head:
YOUNG MILLIONAIRE URGES ON POLICE
The next pyramid contained his name; the story related how he had
rushed frantically to the police after they had barbarously charged a
harmless gathering of workingmen, trampling and maiming half a dozen,
and had demanded that they charge again. It was a long story, with
infinite detail, crucifying him with cheap ink; making him appear a
ruthless, heartless monster, lusting for the spilled blood of the
innocent.
Bonbright looked up to meet Lightener's eyes.
"It--it isn't fair," he said, chokingly.
"Fairness," said Lightener, almost with gentleness, "is expected only
when we are young."
"But I didn't.... I tried to stop them."
"Don't try to tell anybody so--you won't be believed."
"I'm going to tell somebody," said Bonbright, his mind flashing to Ruth
Frazer, "and I'm going to be believed. I've got to be believed."
After a while he said: "I wasn't taking sides. I just went there to
see. If I've got to hire men all my life I want to understand them."
"You've got to take sides, son. There's no straddling the fence in this
world.... And as soon as you've taken sides your own side is all you'll
understand. Nobody ever understood the other side."
"But can't there ever be an understanding? Won't capital ever
understand labor, or labor capital?"
"I suppose a philosopher would say there is no difference upon which
agreement can't be reached; that there must somewhere be a common
meeting ground.... The Bible says the lion shall lie down with the
lamb, but I don't expect to live to see him do it without worrying some
about the lion's teeth."
"It's one man holding power over other men," said Bonbright.
As the car stopped at Malcolm Lightener's door, sudden panic seized
Bonbright.
"I ought not to come here," he said, "after last night. Mrs.
Lightener... your daughter."
"I'll bet Hilda's worrying you more than her mother. Nonsense! They
both got sense."
Certainly Mrs. Lightener had.
"Just got him out of the police station," her husband said as he led
the uncomfortable Bonbright into her presence. "Been shut up all
night.... Rioting--that's what he's been doing. Throwing stones at the
cops."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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