"Do you suppose I can stand for this sort of thing coming from New York?" he began. "What's the matter out there with you?"
"Just what we might expect," Halsey replied coolly. "I've tried to cut down the expenses, but the men won't take the cut in wages."
"Why won't they?"
Halsey smiled. "They have a hundred answers for that. One is, that they can't live on the wages, and another is, that they want the union scale."
"They'll never unionize our factory, Mr. Halsey! If they did, we might as well throw away all our money and tell them our secret at the start—we'd be working for them, not they for us."
"That's all right, sir. I think, myself, an open shop is safer for us. But the unions make all sorts of disturbances. I can't keep on a steady crew; and unless I do, I have to start in and educate a new set of men every week, or every day; and I have to be careful what I let any of them know. I can't help it, Mr. Rawn."
"Well, we'll have to help it, that's all," Rawn retorted grimly. "If the unions want fight they can have fight, until we get to the place where we can take all the fight out of them. These laboring men want to stop the whole progress of this country—they're a drag on the industry of this country, a continuous tax on all consumers. I'll show them! Once we get those motors installed, I'll make them crawl."
IV
"And yet, do you know, Charles," he went on a little later, his voice almost trembling, "the injustice of this conduct is what cuts me. I've had it in my mind to do something for the laboring men of this country. Of course, I've seen all along that the general introduction of our motors into all sorts of industrial uses would throw hundreds and thousands of laboring men out of employment—put them on the scrap heap permanently. What are they going to do then? Some one's got to feed them just the same, as you once said to me, long ago. You talk about problems!—Why, we haven't got to the great ones in this country yet. The cost of living certainly will climb when that day comes. And the scale of wages will go down, when we abolish the man who has only muscle to sell. How are they going to eat?
"Now, I've foreseen something of this, and planned for it. These people can't plan for themselves, and it's always got to be some stronger mind that does the thinking. You know, I was born in Texas. I've always resolved to do something for that state; and, as I've just told you, I've always had it in mind to do something for the laboring man—that is to say, the man who sees himself just as he really is, and who doesn't rate himself worth just the same as the fellow next door to him, so much and no more.