The man turned upon him roughly. “Uh-huh! That's it, is it? That's why you're getting so smart all of a sudden about government! Look a-here. Just l'me tell you something. You're lucky if you git enough to eat this winter. Do you know there's talk of the factory shuttin' down? Dog tax! Why you're lucky if you git shoes.”
Stubby had turned away and was standing with his back to his father, hands in his pockets.
“And l'me tell you some'en else, young man. If you got any dollar and eighty cents, you give it to your mother!”
As Stubby was turning the corner of the house he called after him: “How'd you like to have me get you an automobile?”
He went doggedly from house to house the next afternoon, but nobody had any jobs. When Hero came running out to him that night he patted him, but didn't speak.
That evening as they were sitting in the back yard—Stubby and Hero a little apart from the others—his father was discoursing with his brother about anarchists. They were getting commoner, his father thought. There were a good many of them at the shop. They didn't call themselves that, but that was what they were.
“Well, what is an anarchist, anyhow?” Stubby's mother wanted to know.
“Why, an anarchist,” her lord informed her, “is one that's against the government. He don't believe in the law and order. The real bad anarchists shoot them that tries to enforce the laws of the land. Guess if you'd read the papers these days you'd know.”
Stubby's brain had been going round and round and these words caught in it as it whirled. The government—the laws of the land—why, it was the government and the laws of the land that were going to shoot Hero! It was the government—the laws of the land—that didn't care how hard you had tried—didn't care whether you had been cheated—didn't care how you felt—didn't care about anything except getting the money! His brain got hotter. Well, he didn't believe in the government, either. He was one of those people—those anarchists—that were against the laws of the land.
He'd done the very best he could and now the government was going to take Hero away from him just because he couldn't get—couldn't get—that other seventy cents.