The Cost [52]
a great deal to her had she known the history of that strike and how hard he had fought before he gave in--"we've paid thirty per cent. higher wages. Yet the profits are--well, you can imagine."
"And you've made millions for yourself and for those in with you."
"I haven't developed my ideas for nothing."
She paused again. It was several minutes before she went on:
"When a doctor or a man of science or a philosopher makes a discovery that'll be a benefit to the world"--she looked at him suddenly, earnest, appealing--"he gives it freely. And he gets honor and fame. Why shouldn't you do that, John?" She had forgotten herself in her subject.
He smiled into the fire--hardly a day passed that he did not have presented to him some scheme for relieving him of the burden of his riches; here was another, and from such an unexpected quarter!
"You could be rich, too. We spend twenty, fifty times as much as we can possibly enjoy; and you have more than we could possibly spend. Why shouldn't a man with financial genius be like men with other kinds of genius? Why should he be the only one to stay down on the level with dull, money-grubbing, sordid kinds of people? Why shouldn't he have ideals?"
He made no reply. Indeed, so earnest was she that she did not give him time, but immediately went on:
"Just think, John! Instead of giving out in these charities and philanthropies--I never did believe in them--they're bound to be more or less degrading to the people that take, and when it's so hard to help a friend with money without harming him, how much harder it must be to help strangers. Instead of those things, why not be really great? Just think, John, how the world would honor you and how you would feel, if you used your genius to make the necessaries cheap for all these fellow-beings of ours who have such a hard time getting on. That would be real superiority--and our life now is so vain, so empty. It's brutal, John."
"What do you propose?" he asked, curious as always when a new idea was presented to him. And this was certainly new--apparently, philanthropy without expense.
"You are master. You can do as you please. Why not put your great combine on such a basis that it would bring an honest, just return to you and the others, and would pay the highest possible wages, and would give the people the benefit of what your genius for manufacturing and for finance has made possible? I think we who are so comfortable and never have to think of the necessaries of life forget how much a few cents here and there mean to most people. And the things you control mean all the difference between warmth and cold, between life and death, John!"
As she talked he settled back into his chair, and his face hardened into its unyielding expression. A preposterous project! Just like a good, sentimental woman. Not philanthropy without expense, but philanthropy at the expense both, of his fortune and of his position as a master. To use his brain and his life for those ungrateful people who derided his benefactions as either contributions to "the conscience fund" or as indirect attempts at public bribery! He could not conceal his impatience--though he did not venture to put it into words.
"If we--if you and I, John," she hurried on, leaning toward him in her earnestness, "had something like that to live for, it might come to be very different with us--and--I'm thinking of Gardiner most of all. This'll ruin him some day. No one, NO ONE, can lead this kind of life without being dragged down, without becoming selfish and sordid and cruel."
"You don't understand," he said curtly, without looking at her. "I never heard of such--such sentimentalism."
She winced and was silent, sat watching his bold, strong profile. Presently she said in a changed, strange, strained voice: "What I asked to see you for was--John, won't you put the prices--at least where they were at the beginning of this dreadful winter?"
"Oh--I see!" he exclaimed. "You've been listening to the lies about me."
"READING," she said,
"And you've made millions for yourself and for those in with you."
"I haven't developed my ideas for nothing."
She paused again. It was several minutes before she went on:
"When a doctor or a man of science or a philosopher makes a discovery that'll be a benefit to the world"--she looked at him suddenly, earnest, appealing--"he gives it freely. And he gets honor and fame. Why shouldn't you do that, John?" She had forgotten herself in her subject.
He smiled into the fire--hardly a day passed that he did not have presented to him some scheme for relieving him of the burden of his riches; here was another, and from such an unexpected quarter!
"You could be rich, too. We spend twenty, fifty times as much as we can possibly enjoy; and you have more than we could possibly spend. Why shouldn't a man with financial genius be like men with other kinds of genius? Why should he be the only one to stay down on the level with dull, money-grubbing, sordid kinds of people? Why shouldn't he have ideals?"
He made no reply. Indeed, so earnest was she that she did not give him time, but immediately went on:
"Just think, John! Instead of giving out in these charities and philanthropies--I never did believe in them--they're bound to be more or less degrading to the people that take, and when it's so hard to help a friend with money without harming him, how much harder it must be to help strangers. Instead of those things, why not be really great? Just think, John, how the world would honor you and how you would feel, if you used your genius to make the necessaries cheap for all these fellow-beings of ours who have such a hard time getting on. That would be real superiority--and our life now is so vain, so empty. It's brutal, John."
"What do you propose?" he asked, curious as always when a new idea was presented to him. And this was certainly new--apparently, philanthropy without expense.
"You are master. You can do as you please. Why not put your great combine on such a basis that it would bring an honest, just return to you and the others, and would pay the highest possible wages, and would give the people the benefit of what your genius for manufacturing and for finance has made possible? I think we who are so comfortable and never have to think of the necessaries of life forget how much a few cents here and there mean to most people. And the things you control mean all the difference between warmth and cold, between life and death, John!"
As she talked he settled back into his chair, and his face hardened into its unyielding expression. A preposterous project! Just like a good, sentimental woman. Not philanthropy without expense, but philanthropy at the expense both, of his fortune and of his position as a master. To use his brain and his life for those ungrateful people who derided his benefactions as either contributions to "the conscience fund" or as indirect attempts at public bribery! He could not conceal his impatience--though he did not venture to put it into words.
"If we--if you and I, John," she hurried on, leaning toward him in her earnestness, "had something like that to live for, it might come to be very different with us--and--I'm thinking of Gardiner most of all. This'll ruin him some day. No one, NO ONE, can lead this kind of life without being dragged down, without becoming selfish and sordid and cruel."
"You don't understand," he said curtly, without looking at her. "I never heard of such--such sentimentalism."
She winced and was silent, sat watching his bold, strong profile. Presently she said in a changed, strange, strained voice: "What I asked to see you for was--John, won't you put the prices--at least where they were at the beginning of this dreadful winter?"
"Oh--I see!" he exclaimed. "You've been listening to the lies about me."
"READING," she said,