The Gibson Upright
by
Booth Tarkington
Part 1 out of 2
Produced by Suzanne Shell, Linda Cantoni, and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team.
The
Gibson Upright
By
BOOTH TARKINGTON
and
HARRY LEON WILSON
1919
THE STAGE PRODUCTION OF THIS PLAY IS BY STUART WALKER
THE GIBSON UPRIGHT
CAST OF CHARACTERS
ANDREW GIBSON, a piano factory owner
NORA GORODNA, a piano tester and socialist labor organizer
MR. MIFFLIN, a socialist journalist
CARTER, an elderly factory worker
FRANKEL, a young Jewish factory worker
SHOMBERG, a factory worker
SIMPSON, an elderly factory worker
SALVATORE, an Italian factory worker
RILEY, a truck driver
ELLA, Mr. Gibson's housemaid
MRS. SIMPSON, wife of Simpson
MRS. COMMISKEY, wife of a worker (offstage voice)
POLENSKI, a worker
FIRST WOP and SECOND WOP, workers
ACT I
ANDREW GIBSON'S _office in his piano factory where he
manufactures "The Gibson Upright." A very plain interior;
pleasant to the eye, yet distinctly an office in a factory, and
without luxuries; altogether utilitarian.
Against the wall on our right is a roll-top desk, open, very
neat, and in the centre of the writing pad a fresh rose stands
in a glass of water. Near by is a long, plain table and upon it
a very neat arrangement of correspondence and a couple of
ledgers.
Against the walls are a dozen plain cane-seated chairs. Near
the centre of the room is a sample of the Gibson upright piano
in light wood. There is a large safe, showing the word
"Gibson," and there are filing cases. In the rear wall there is
a door with the upper half of opaque glass, which shows "Mr.
Gibson" in reverse; and near this door is a water filter upon a
stand. In the wall upon our left is a plain wooden door. The
rear door opens into the factory; the other into a hall that
leads to the street.
Upon the walls are several posters, one showing "The Gibson
Upright"--a happy family, including children and a grandparent,
exclaiming with joy at sight of this instrument. Another shows
a concert singer singing widely beside "The Gibson Upright,"
with an accompanist seated. Another shows a semi-colossal
millionaire, and a workingman of similar size in paper cap and
apron, shaking hands across "The Gibson Upright," and, printed:
"$188.00--The Price for the Millionaire, the Same for Plain
John Smith--$188.00." This poster and the others all show the
slogan: "How Cheap, BUT How Good!"
Nothing is new in this room, but everything is clean and
accurately in order. The arrangement is symmetrical.
As the curtain rises_ NORA GORODNA _is seen at work on the
sample "Gibson Upright." The front is not removed; but through
the top of the piano she is adjusting something with a small
wrench._ NORA _is a fine-looking young woman, not over
twenty-six; she wears a plain smock over a dark dress. As she
is a piano tester in the factory she is dressed neither so
roughly as a working woman nor perhaps so fashionably as a
stenographer. She is serious and somewhat preoccupied. From
somewhere come the sounds of several pianos being tuned. After
a moment_ NORA _goes thoughtfully to the desk and looks at the
rose in the glass; then lifts the glass as if to inhale the
odour of the rose, but abruptly alters her decision and sets
the glass down without doing so. She returns quickly and
decisively to her work at the piano, as if she had made a
determination.
A bell at the door on our left rings._ NORA _goes to the door
and opens it._
NORA: Good morning, Mr. Mifflin.
MIFFLIN [_entering_]: Good morning, Miss Gorodna.
[MIFFLIN _is a beaming man of forty, with gold-rimmed
eyeglasses and a somewhat grizzled beard which has been, a week
or so ago, a neatly trimmed Vandyke. He wears a "cutaway suit,"
not much pressed, not new; a derby hat, a standing collar, and
a "four-in-hand" dark tie; hard, round cuffs, not link cuffs.
He carries a folded umbrella, not a fashionable one; wears no
gloves; and has two or three old magazines and a newspaper
under his arm._]
MIFFLIN: I believe I'm here just to the hour, Miss Gorodna.
NORA: Mr. Gibson has been very nice about it. He told me he would give
you the interview for your article. He's in the factory--trying to
settle some things he _can't_ settle. I'll let him know you're here.
[_She goes out by the door into the factory._ MIFFLIN, _smiling
with benevolent anticipation, places his umbrella and hat on a
chair, then takes his fountain pen and a pencil from his
pocket, smilingly decides to use the pencil, sharpens it
without going to a wastebasket over by the desk; then beamingly
looks about the room. He is about to strike a chord on the
piano, seems alarmed by the idea, moves away from it, dusts the
lapel of his coat, adjusts his collar, studies the posters,
shakes his head over them as if they were not to his taste,
goes to the desk, and after studying it smiles at the rose and
gives it a kittenish peck with his forefinger._ NORA _comes
back and_ MIFFLIN _turns to her with his benevolent smile._]
NORA [_going back to her work at the piano_]: He'll be right here.
[GIBSON _appears in the open doorway, speaking with crisp
determination to someone not seen._]
GIBSON: That's my last word on it; that's in accordance with the
agreement you signed two weeks ago.
A HARSH VOICE: We don't care nothin' about no agreement!
GIBSON: That's all!
[_He comes in. He is a man of thirty-something; well but not
clubbishly dressed; an intelligent, thoughtful face; a man of
affairs. Just now he is exercising some self-control over
irritations which have become habitual, but he is not
uncordial, merely quiet, during his greeting of_ MIFFLIN.]
NORA: This is Mr. Mifflin, Mr. Gibson.
GIBSON: How do you do, Mr. Mifflin.
MIFFLIN [_heartily, as they shake hands_]: I am very glad to meet you,
Mr. Gibson! I hope you don't mind my not writing to you myself for this
interview.
GIBSON: Not at all!
MIFFLIN [_taking a chair_]: I heard Miss Gorodna speak at a meeting two
nights ago--
GIBSON: Yes?
MIFFLIN: And learning that she was one of your employees I asked her to
speak to you about it for me.
GIBSON: I see.
MIFFLIN: Now, in the first place, Mr. Gibson--
[_There is a telephone on_ GIBSON'S _desk; its bell rings._]
GIBSON: Excuse me a moment!
[_At the telephone_]: Hello!... Yes--Gibson.... Oh, hello, McCombs!...
Yes. I want you to buy it.... I want you to buy all of that grade wire
you can lay your hands on. Get it now and go quick. All you can get; I
don't care if it's a three years' supply. There'll be a shortage within
a month.... No; I don't want any more of the celluloid mixture.... No, I
don't want it. They can't make a figure good enough. I've got my own
formula for keys and we're going to make our own mixture.... I'm going
to have my own plant for it right here. I can make it just under fifty
per cent, better than I can buy it.... Wait a minute! I want you to get
hold of that lot of felt over in Newark; the syndicate's after it, but I
want you to beat them to it. Don't go to Johnson. You go to
Hendricks--he's Johnson's brother-in-law. You tell him as my purchasing
agent you've come to finish the talk I had with him the other night.
You'll find that does it.... All right. Wait! Call me up to-morrow
afternoon; I'm on the track of a stock of that brass we've been using.
We may get three-eighths of a cent off on it. I'll know by that time.
All right!... All right! [_Then he hangs up the receiver and turns to_
MIFFLIN.] Where do you propose to publish this interview, Mr. Mifflin?
MIFFLIN [_cheerily_]: Oh, I shall select one of the popular magazines in
sympathy with my point of view in these matters. You probably know my
articles. Numbers of them have been translated. One called "Cooeperation
and Brotherhood" has been printed in thirteen languages and dialects,
including the Scandinavian. But I expect this to be my star article.
GIBSON: Why?
MIFFLIN: Because your factory here is so often called a model factory.
"_The_ model factory!" [_He repeats the phrase with unction._]
GIBSON [_wearily_]: Yes, model because it has the most labour trouble!
MIFFLIN [_enthusiastically_]: That is the real reason why it will be my
star article. As you may know from my other articles this problem is
where I am in my element.
GIBSON: Yes; I understood so from Miss Gorodna.
[_Giving him an inimical glance,_ NORA _closes the top of
piano, and moves to go._ GIBSON _checks her with a slight
gesture._]
GIBSON: Would you mind staying, Miss Gorodna? Miss Gorodna knows more
about one side of this factory than I do, I'm afraid, Mr. Mifflin. We
may need her for reference, especially as she seems to be the ringleader
of the insurgents.
MIFFLIN [_with jovial reproach_]: Now, now! Before we come to that, Mr.
Gibson, suppose we get at the origin of this interesting product. [_He
waves to the sample piano._] Let's see! I understand it was never your
own creation, Mr. Gibson; that you inherited this factory from your
father.
GIBSON: Oh, no, I didn't.
NORA [_challenging_]: _What!_ [_She checks herself._] I beg your pardon!
GIBSON: The piano factory I inherited from my father was about one third
this size.
MIFFLIN [_genially; always genial_]: Nevertheless, you inherited it. We
know that everything grows with the times, naturally. Let us simply
state that it was a capitalistic family inheritance.
NORA [_under her breath but emphatically_]: Yes!
MIFFLIN: Up to the time of your inheriting it, you, I suppose, had led
the usual life of pleasure of the wealthy young man?
GIBSON: I'd been through school and college and through every department
of the factory. That wasn't hard; it was a pretty run-down factory, Mr.
Mifflin.
MIFFLIN: And then at your father's death the lives and fortunes, souls
and bodies of all these workmen passed into your hands?
GIBSON: Not quite that; there were only forty-one workmen, and nineteen
of them didn't stay when father died. They got other jobs before I could
stop them.
MIFFLIN: And how many men have you now?
GIBSON: I believe there are one hundred and seventy-five on the pay roll
now.
MIFFLIN: One hundred and seventy-five [_with gusto_] labourers!
GIBSON: Some of them are; some of them are orators.
MIFFLIN [_jovially_]: Ah, I'm afraid that's hard on Miss Gorodna.
GIBSON [_quietly_]: She's both.
MIFFLIN: I understand you are _not_ fighting the labour unions?
GIBSON: No. The workmen themselves declined to unionize the factory.
MIFFLIN: Mr. Gibson, when your father began manufacturing "The Gibson
Upright"--
GIBSON: He didn't. He made a very fine piano--and only a few of them. It
was "The Gibson Upright" that saved the factory. You see, with this
model we began to get on a quantity-production basis. That's why the
business has grown and is growing.
MIFFLIN: You mean that "The Gibson Upright" is the reason for the
present great prosperity of this plant?
GIBSON: Yes.
MIFFLIN: Now be careful, Mr. Gibson; I'm going to ask a trap question.
[_Wagging his pencil at him._] What is the reason for "The Gibson
Upright?"
GIBSON: Do you mean who designed it?
MIFFLIN: Oh, no, no, no! I mean who _makes_ them? If someone asked you
if you're the man that makes "The Gibson Upright" wouldn't you say
"Yes?"
GIBSON: Certainly!
MIFFLIN [_triumphantly_]: Ah, there you fell into the trap!
GIBSON: What's the matter?
NORA [_with controlled agitation_]: It's the same old matter, Mr.
Gibson. It's those men out there that make the piano.
GIBSON [_a little sadly_]: Do they?
NORA: With their _hands_, Mr. Gibson!
GIBSON: Is there anything more, Mr. Mifflin?
MIFFLIN: You couldn't possibly imagine how much you've given me, Mr.
Gibson, in these few little answers. It is precisely what I want to get
at--the point of view! The point of view is all that is separating the
classes from the masses to-day. And I think I have yours already. Now I
want to go to the masses if you will permit me.
GIBSON: Then you might as well stay here.
MIFFLIN: Ah, but I want to hear the workers talk!
GIBSON: Well, this is the best place for that! Some of them are waiting
now just outside the door. I'll let you hear them.
[_Goes to the factory door and opens it; two workingmen come
in. One is elderly, with gray moustache and beard--_CARTER.
_The other,_ FRANKEL, _is a Hebraic type, eager and nervous;
younger._]
GIBSON: What do you and Frankel want, Carter?
CARTER [_moving his jaw from side to side, affecting to chew to gain
confidence_]: Well, Mr. Gibson, to come down to plain words--there ain't
no two best ways o' beatin' about the bush.
GIBSON: I know that.
CARTER: The question is just up to where there ain't no two best ways
out of it. The men in our department is going to walk out to the last
one, and if there was any way o' stoppin' it by argument I'd tell you.
We're goin' out at twelve o'clock noon to-day, the whole forty-eight of
us.
GIBSON: Why?
FRANKEL: "_Why_," Mr. Gibson! Did you want to know _why_?
GIBSON: Yes, I do. You men signed an agreement with me just eleven days
ago--
FRANKEL [_hotly protesting_]: But we never understood it when we signed
it. How'd we know what we was signing?
GIBSON: Can't you read, Frankel?
FRANKEL: What's reading got to do with it, when it reads all one way?
GIBSON: Didn't you understand it, Carter?
CARTER: Well--I can't say I did.
GIBSON: _Why_ can't you say it? It was plain black and white.
CARTER: Well, I was kind o' foggy about the overtime.
GIBSON: The agreement was that you were to have time and a half for
overtime. What was foggy about that?
CARTER: Well, I don't say you didn't give us what we was askin' right
_then_; but things have changed since then.
GIBSON: What's changed in eleven days?
FRANKEL [_hotly_]: What's changed? How about them men in the finishin'
department that do piecework?
GIBSON: Well, what's changed about them?
FRANKEL: Well, something _is_ goin' to change over there.
GIBSON: We're talking about your department not understanding the
agreement. What's the finishing department got to do with that?
FRANKEL: Well, they're kickin', too, you bet!
GIBSON: I'm dealing with your kick now.
CARTER: Well, o' course we got to stand with them; if they do piecework
overtime they don't get no more for it.
GIBSON: I'll deal with them separately.
FRANKEL: My goodness, Mr. Gibson, you got to deal with us, too! Not a
one of us understood what our last agreement with you was. It's just
agreements and agreements and agreements--you might think we was living
just on agreements! By rights we ought to have double time instead of
time and a half!
GIBSON: Time and a half eleven days ago; now you strike for double time!
Where does this thing stop? You want double time for overtime; your
working day has been reduced; it won't be long till you want that cut
down again.
FRANKEL: Sure! We want it cut down right now!
CARTER: Yes, Mr. Gibson; that was another point they told us to bring up
before we walk out.
GIBSON [_with growing exasperation_]: I suppose you want a six-hour day
so you'll have more overtime to double on me! Then you'll want a
four-hour day, won't you?
MIFFLIN [_beaming and nodding_]: Well, why not, Mr. Gibson?
GIBSON: What?
NORA: Why shouldn't they?
GIBSON: Why shouldn't they? But what's their limit?
NORA [_oratorically_]: When the workman shall own his tools!
MIFFLIN: Of course that means _all_ the tools, Mr. Gibson. You may not
know our phrase: "The workman shall own his tools." It means not only
the carpenter's bench, the plane and the saw, the adze and the auger,
but the shop itself. It means that the workmen shall own the factory. It
means the elimination of everything and everyone who stands between him
and the purchaser, to take toll and unearned profit from the worker, who
is really the sole producer of wealth.
NORA: It means the elimination of capital and the capitalist!
MIFFLIN: It means that not only should the worker own tools and factory
but should sit here in the persons of his chosen and elected fellow
workers, as arbiter of his own destiny.
GIBSON: That is to say, it means the elimination of me.
MIFFLIN [_jovially_]: Precisely! Precisely!
GIBSON [_as another workingman strides into the room_]: What do you
want, Shomberg?
SHOMBERG: Them new windows in the assembling room--they're no good.
GIBSON: We've just spent twelve hundred dollars fixing them as you said
you wanted them. What's the matter with them?
SHOMBERG: They don't give no light.
MIFFLIN: None at all?
SHOMBERG: It's right next to none at all! The men are goin' to lay off
if they got to work in that room. They're goin' out anyway at twelve
o'clock.
FRANKEL: Now look here, Mr. Gibson, if I was running this factory--
GIBSON: You're not, Frankel!
SHOMBERG: Well, why can't you listen to him? Don't we even get no
hearing? I guess if I was running this factory once, the first thing I'd
do I'd anyhow try to listen what the troubles is and make my men
contented.
GIBSON: What would you do if you were running the factory, Carter? You
haven't said.
CARTER: I ain't had the chance to say. Now what I'd do, first I'd settle
all the grievances so there wouldn't be no more complaints.
GIBSON: Well, here's one coming I might leave to you on that basis.
[_Enter_ SIMPSON, _an elderly worker in overalls and jumper;
and_ SALVATORE, _a New Yorkized Italian type, a formerly
lighted cigarette dangling from his lips._]
SALVATORE: Our department's goin' to walk out at twelve, noon, Mr.
Gibson. We ain't satisfied.
GIBSON: Why not?
SALVATORE: Well, we ain't satisfied, Mr. Gibson; we ain't satisfied at
all.
GIBSON: You got every demand answered yesterday, Salvatore.
SALVATORE: Oh, I ain't talkin' about no demands. If all them other
departments walks out we're going to stand by 'em! We got plenty to do
with our time. Workin' all the time ain't so enjoyable.
GIBSON: So you people are going out again, are you?
SIMPSON: I guess it's a general strike, Mr. Gibson. I'm afraid if you
don't give the boys satisfactory answers the place will close down at
noon.
GIBSON: Have satisfactory answers ever satisfied you?
SALVATORE: Ain't we got no right to stand up for our rights?
FRANKEL: Don't you get all you can from _us_? Well, you bet your life
we're goin' to keep on gettin' all we can from _you_!
GIBSON: Then life isn't worth anything to either of us--if it's all
fight! Is that to go on forever?
NORA: No, Mr. Gibson; it's to go on until the abolition of the wage
system!
MIFFLIN: Good!
NORA: The struggle with capitalism will continue till the workers take
possession of the machinery of production. It is theirs by right; the
wealth they produce is morally their own. The parasites who now consume
that wealth must be destroyed.
[_Great approval from workmen; almost a cheer._ MIFFLIN
_chuckles and noiselessly claps his hands._]
GIBSON: I'm the parasite!
SHOMBERG: Well, do we get any answer?
GIBSON: Does any one of you men here think he could answer all of these
demands satisfactorily?
SALVATORE: Sure! [_All acquiesce: "Sure, sure!"_]
FRANKEL: You can't put us off any longer with just no little bunch of
funny talk!
GIBSON: I'll have an answer for you in fifteen minutes. [_Turns to his
desk._] That's all.
SHOMBERG: Better have it before twelve o'clock.
CARTER [_as they go_]: Do what you kin, Mr. Gibson. All the departments
is worked up pretty unusual.
GIBSON [_wearily dropping back into his chair_]: Oh, no, Carter; pretty
usual; that's the trouble.
MIFFLIN: A splendid manifestation of spirit, Mr. Gibson! I'll just take
advantage of the--
[GIBSON _waves his hand, assenting._ MIFFLIN _overtakes the
group at door, puts his hands on the shoulders of two of the
workers; and goes out with them talking eagerly._ NORA
_follows._ GIBSON _sighs heavily; the telephone bell rings. He
takes up the receiver._]
GIBSON: Who is it?... Wait a minute! [_He takes a pad and writes_]:
"Central Associated Lumber Companies." ... Wait a minute. [_Looks at a
slip in a pigeonhole of his desk._] Oh, yes, you called me yesterday....
This is Mr. Ragsdale?... No, no, Mr. Ragsdale, I don't think I'm going
to do any business with you. You asked me forty-eight dollars a thousand
on 200,000 feet.... No, your coming down half a dollar a thousand won't
do it.... I say seventeen cents won't do it.... Hold the wire a minute.
[_Looks for letter in pigeonhole, but finds it in his inside pockets.
Then he holds it open, looking at it beside the telephone as he
speaks._] Hello!... No; I was right; there's nothing doing, Mr.
Ragsdale, I know where I can get that 200,000 feet at forty-five
dollars.... I say I know where I can get that lumber at forty-five
dollars.... No; I can get it. There won't be any use for you to call up
again.... Good-bye!
[_He paces the floor again thoughtfully, then abruptly goes to
the factory door; opens it and calls._]
GIBSON: Miss Gorodna!
[NORA _appears in the doorway. She looks at him with
disapproving inquiry; then walks in and closes the door. He
goes to his desk and touches the rose._]
GIBSON: Why didn't you take it this morning? That poor little rosebed in
my yard at home; it's just begun to brighten up. I suppose it thought it
was going to send you a June rose every day, as it did last June. You
don't want it?
NORA [_gently, but not abating her attitude_]: No, thank you!
GIBSON: [_dropping the rose upon his blotting pad, not into the glass
again_]: This is the fourth that's had to wither disappointed.
NORA [_in a low voice_]: Then hadn't you better let the others live?
GIBSON: I'd like to live a little myself, Nora. Life doesn't seem much
worth living for me as it is, and if your theories are making you detest
me I think I'm about through.
NORA: It's what you stand for that my theories make me detest--since you
used the word.
GIBSON: Well, what is it that I stand for?
NORA: Class and class hatred.
GIBSON: Which class is the hatred coming from?
NORA: From both!
GIBSON: Just in this room right now it seems to be all on one side. And
lately it has seemed to me to be more and more not so much class as
personal; because really, Nora, I haven't yet been able to understand
how a girl with your mind can believe that you and I belong to different
classes.
NORA: You don't! So long as capital exists you and I are in warring
classes, Mr. Gibson.
GIBSON: What are they?
NORA: Capitalist and proletariat. You can't get out of your class and I
don't want to get out of mine.
GIBSON: Nora, the law of the United States doesn't recognize any
classes--and I don't know why you and I should. We both like Montaigne
and Debussy. You've even condescended to laugh with me at times about
something funny in the shop. Of course not lately; but you used to. In
everything worth anything aren't we really in the same class?
NORA: We are not. We never shall be--and we never were! Even before we
were born we weren't! You came into this life with a silver spoon. I was
born in a tenement room where five other people lived. My father was a
man with a great brain. He never got out of the tenements in his life;
he was crushed and kept under; yet he was a well-read man and a
magnificent talker; he could talk Marx and Tolstoi supremely. Yet he
never even had time to learn English.
GIBSON: I wish you could have heard what _my_ father talked for English!
Half the time I couldn't understand him myself. He was Scotch.
NORA: Your father wasn't crushed under the capitalistic system as mine
was. My father was an intellectual.
GIBSON: Mine was a worker. They both landed at Castle Garden, didn't
they?
NORA: What of that? Mine remained a thinker and a revolutionist; yours
became a capitalist.
GIBSON: No; he got a job--in a piano factory.
NORA: Yes, and took advantage of the capitalistic system to own the
factory.
GIBSON: Before he did own it he worked fourteen hours a day for twelve
years. That's why he owned it.
NORA: How many hours a day do you work, Mr. Gibson?
GIBSON: I _have_ worked twenty-four; sometimes fourteen, sometimes two;
usually six.
NORA: In other words, when you want to work.
GIBSON: I've learned to do things my father never learned to do, and it
commands a higher return.
NORA: You _take_ a higher return!
GIBSON: You mean I don't deserve it?
NORA: Can it be possible that you think you deserve as much as any of
these _workers_? You don't so much as touch one of these pianos that
bring you your return. I do! I work on them with my hands. Do you think
you deserve as much as I?
GIBSON: No; I don't go so far as that.
NORA: Don't talk to me as a woman! My work is pleasant enough now; but
what work did I have to do before I got this far? I worked sixteen hours
a day, and when I was only a child at that! Twelve hours I was sewing,
and four I studied. If my father hadn't known music and taught me a
little your capitalistic system would have me sewing twelve hours a day
still!
GIBSON: Yes, Nora; when we learn how to do something we get better pay
for it.
NORA: We do? Do you really think that? That we get paid for what we do?
GIBSON: Yes; that's what I think.
NORA: Then what do you get paid for? For nothing in the world but owning
this factory. You're paid because you're a capitalist!
GIBSON: Is that all?
NORA: Why, look at the state the factory's in! The discontent you saw in
those men--that's the fault of the capitalistic system! There aren't
twenty workmen in the place that are contented.
GIBSON: You're right about that; and they never will be.
NORA: Not until the system's changed. What are you going to do about it?
GIBSON [_with quiet desperation_]: They've driven me as far as they
can. If they walk out I'll walk out. I can stand it if they can.
NORA: You'd close down? Your only solution is to take the bread out of
these men's mouths?
GIBSON: If they walk out I'll walk out!
NORA [_trembling_]: You coward!
GIBSON: That's fair?
NORA: You'll let us starve because you haven't the courage to come to
the right solution! Don't you mind starving us?
GIBSON: You mean you'd starve if I quit.
NORA [_vehemently_]: No; but because you'd close the factory.
GIBSON: Oh, the factory could run if I quit, could it?
NORA: That's the capitalist! They think it's capital that runs the
factories!
GIBSON: And I'm the capital, am I?
NORA: What in the world else? [_Touches the piano._] You think you
produce this wealth because you've got your money in it? You pass out a
pittance to those who do produce it, and when they ask for more than a
pittance you take their tools away from them! If they rebel you set the
police on them. That's capital--and that's you, Mr. Gibson!
GIBSON: Nora, you told me not to speak to you as a woman.
NORA: I mean it!
GIBSON: I'm going to disregard it. Couldn't you get your theories out of
your mind for a while and make a little room there for me?
NORA: My theories! I haven't any theories! I'm talking about the truth,
and the truth is my whole life. I can't find room for anything but the
truth.
GIBSON: Couldn't you?
NORA: Ah, that's a man's egoism! With the whole world seething so that
its wrongs should fill every mind--yes, and every heart--until they're
righted, you ask me--
GIBSON: I think you needn't make it any clearer, Nora; I understand.
NORA [_turning away, agitated_]: I am glad you do.
[_The factory door opens to the impetuous arrival of a
workingman of extraordinary size and vehemence_, RILEY, _a
truck driver._]
RILEY [_as he opens the door_]: See here, Mr. Gibson, fer the love o'
heaven, don't the truck drivers fer this factory git no consideration?
GIBSON: I don't know! What do they want?
RILEY: Look here, Mr. Gibson, man to man, every department in this
factory is makin' demands and goin' to walk out if they don't git 'em.
Ain't we got no chance fer no demands?
GIBSON: I said: What do you want?
RILEY: Why, we got grievances been hangin' over I don't know how long!
GIBSON: What are they?
RILEY: Why, all them other departments is going to git raises. You don't
think fer a minute the truck drivers ain't going to--
GIBSON: How much raise do you want?
RILEY: Sir?
GIBSON: How much raise do you want?
RILEY: I can't jest say right this minute. We jest heard what was goin'
on in the other departments, and we ain't had no meetin' to settle just
what raise we _are_ goin' to git. Now, Mr. Gibson, if I was runnin' this
factory--
GIBSON: Well, what would you do?
RILEY: The first thing I'd do, I'd see that the truck drivers didn't
have no more discontent than nobody else. What becomes of your freight
if you can't run no trucks? You got to look out, Mr. Gibson! It's us got
the upper hand.
GIBSON: Go call your meeting and find out what raise you're going to
strike for.
RILEY: Yes, sir; I'll do it. [_He goes out quickly._]
NORA: [_amazed and rather gentle_]: Are you going to give them what they
want?
GIBSON: No; I only wanted to get rid of him a minute to think--or try
to.
NORA [_in a low voice, offended_]: Oh, excuse me! [_She is going out._]
GIBSON: Stay here! [_He seems to approach a decision--one of desperation
and anger. Then he speaks crisply, but more to himself than to_ NORA.]
All right--they get it! [_Looks up at_ NORA, _gives her a frowning stare
of some duration._] Tell Riley to call off his meeting, please. I want
all those spokesmen for the departments here. I'll give them their
answer now.
[NORA _looks at him, puzzled, bites her lip, and goes out
quickly into the factory._ GIBSON'S _expression is determined;
so is his action. He goes to the wall, brings two chairs, one
in each hand, places them at the large table. Repeats this
until he has chairs placed at the table on both sides and at
the head as if for a directors' meeting. The door opens and_
SALVATORE, MIFFLIN, CARTER, RILEY, SHOMBERG, FRANKEL, _and_
SIMPSON _enter. They come in, speaking together; most of them
talking somewhat ominously._]
CROWD: Well, he better!... We ain't workin' for our health.... My whole
department'll walk out!... You bet your life we're goin' to!... He
needn't kid himself about our not meaning business!
FRANKEL: Well, Mr. Gibson, we'd like to know what conclusion you come
to.
GIBSON: I'm going to tell you. Simpson, please ask Miss Gorodna to step
in.
[SIMPSON _merely looks out of the door, and_ NORA _comes in
quickly._]
Carter, take that chair at the head of the table. Frankel, Salvatore,
Shomberg, sit there, and there, and there! Riley, sit there. Simpson,
there! Miss Gorodna, will you please sit here? [_They take the seats he
indicates, but they look puzzled, somewhat perturbed; whisper and murmur
to one another._] Thank you! There! That looks like a directors' tables
doesn't it?
SALVATORE: What's this all about?
GIBSON: I want to ask you people if any of you ever knew me to break my
word to you?
FRANKEL: Oh, no, Mr. Gibson, we know you never break your agreements!
GIBSON: I want to ask you people: Haven't you found my word as good as
my bond?
CARTER: Why, yes, Mr. Gibson.
SIMPSON: Sure! We know you'll do what you say.
GIBSON: Do you all agree to that?
SALVATORE: Soit'nly! You're a gentleman.
RILEY: Sure, we agree to it!
SHOMBERG: Oh, well, prob'ly so.
GIBSON: All right! I'm going to do something you don't expect, and I
want you to know I mean it. But before I do it I want to tell you
something. Probably you won't understand it, but for a long time I had a
pride in this factory. Building up The Gibson Upright was really the
pride of my life. To do that I knew I had to have a loyal staff of
workmen, and for that reason if no other I have given you shorter hours
and more pay than the men get in any other factory of this kind that I
know of. I've done everything that can be done to make the shops healthy
and light and clean. I certainly haven't been unfriendly to you
personally. Any man in the factory was free to come in that door to talk
to me any time he wanted to. I've done my best and we've been called
the model factory. I've done my best but--it isn't enough. It never has
been enough. And I've been told it never will be enough [_with a glance
at_ NORA] until the wage system has been abolished--until capital has
been abolished and the parasite destroyed! I say I took a pride in the
factory for years! Now I am no longer able to. I can't take a pride in a
squabble, and that's all this factory has come to be. And I'll tell you
frankly--you men feel you'd like to get rid of me; well, I want to get
rid of you. And I intend to!
SHOMBERG [_fiercely_]: You goin' to close this factory down?
GIBSON: No; I'm going to give it to you!
SEVERAL WORKMEN: What!
GIBSON [_emphatically_]: I'm going to give it to you! I turn it over to
you, here and now. This property is mine, but the use of it is yours.
Don't you understand? You've said yourselves my word is as good as my
bond. Well, the factory is yours. I'm going to get away from it. You
take it and run it.
[_He gets his hat and coat._]
SIMPSON: What in thunder does he mean?
SALVATORE: Say, what's the game?
GIBSON: There it is! Take it and run it yourselves, for yourselves. It
belongs to every workman in the factory on equal shares. [_Throws keys
on table._] There are the keys of the safe, and the combination's in the
top drawer of that desk. It's all yours as it stands, down to the very
correspondence on that table, without any let, hindrance, or
interference from me.
FRANKEL [_hoarsely_]: Say! He means it!
SALVATORE: All the money ours?
GIBSON: The money for every piano you make and sell is yours--every cent
of it.
MIFFLIN [_rising transfigured_]: Gentlemen, a glorious time has come!
This is an example to every employer of labour in our land. I thank that
power which destined all men to be equal both in service and reward that
I should have chanced to be present to see such a splendid band of
forward-looking fellows--of brothers, of comrades--come into their own!
Let us hope that this great moment but marks the beginning of an epoch
when every capitalist and manufacturer shall see the light as Mr. Gibson
has just done.
As spokesman for these--these men, Mr. Gibson, I would congratulate you
for anticipating the inevitable and certain world future! You have done
well for yourself to perceive it. I am sure on that account you leave
here with their respect. And to you I should think it might be some
relief--
GIBSON: Relief? I should think it might! And you can translate that into
your nineteen languages and dialects--including the Scandinavian! As for
you men--you wouldn't work for me--now see if you can work for
yourselves! Good-bye, Miss Gorodna!
[NORA, _who has been looking at him tensely, inclines her head
slightly. He opens the door that leads to the street and goes
out decisively. There are exclamations from everyone, loud but
awed. "Say, look here, look here, look here!"
"Give it to us!" "Equal shares! Did you hear what he said?"
"Gosh! Is this the end of the world?" "My wife won't believe
it!"_]
MIFFLIN: Gentlemen, this factory comes into the possession of every
workman in it on equal terms; each has a like share in the profits. At
last the workman owns his tools.
FRANKEL [_suddenly, as if light had just come_]: Gibson's crazy!
MIFFLIN: No, no! He saw the writing on the wall!
NORA [_as if entranced, her eyes to heaven_]: Isn't it
wonderful--wonderful!
MIFFLIN [_beaming_]: But we mustn't forget that it entails
responsibilities.
NORA: We mustn't forget that.
[_The telephone bell rings. They all turn their heads in
silence and look at it_, MIFFLIN _watching them, benevolently
chuckling. The bell rings again._]
CARTER [_blankly_]: The telephone is ringin'.
MIFFLIN: Well, answer it, answer it!
SIMPSON: Who?
MIFFLIN: Why, you--any of you. It's yours--it's your telephone.
SIMPSON: You answer it, Carter.
[CARTER _goes to the telephone and picks it up in a somewhat
gingerly way._]
CARTER: Hello!... Yes.... Yes, it's The Gibson Upright.... No, he ain't
here.... What? Wait a minute. [_Puts his hand over the mouthpiece._] He
wants to know who it is talking.
FRANKEL: My goodness! Can't you tell him it's you?
CARTER: He wouldn't know who that was.
MIFFLIN: Tell him it's one of the owners of the company.
CARTER [_looks at_ MIFFLIN _solemnly; then in a hushed voice_]: It's one
of the owners of the company.... Wait a minute; let me get that. "The
Central Associated Lumber Companies?" I hear you. Wait a minute. [_Looks
round._] This here company says they want to lower their bid for a
couple hundred thousand feet o' lumber to forty-seven dollars a
thousand. They say that's a dollar lower than they offered yesterday and
a half a dollar lower than they offered this morning--says got to know
now.
FRANKEL: Says they come _down_ to forty-seven, do they?
CARTER: Yes; says so!
SIMPSON: Well, tell 'em that's good; we'll take it.
THE OTHERS: Sure, that's right!... That's a good offer.... Sure, we'll
take it!
CARTER [_at the telephone_]: We'll take it. [_Pause._] You're welcome.
[_Puts down the telephone amid general buzz from all the
others. They rise somewhat dazedly, but relaxing, beginning to
take in their surroundings in the new life._ SHOMBERG _and_
SIMPSON _shake hands._ FRANKEL _goes over and examines the
safe._ SALVATORE _picks up a basket of correspondence from the
desk as if it were a strange bug._ SHOMBERG _opens a drawer in
the table. There is a buzz of congratulative, formless talk.
They spread over the stage, looking at everything._]
MIFFLIN [_transfigured, his right hand lifted_]: Gentlemen, this is the
New Dawn!
ACT II
_The yard beside_ GIBSON'S _house. Upon our left is seen the
porch or sun-room wing of a good "colonial" house of the
present type. A hedge runs across at the back, about five feet
high, with a gateway and rustic gate. Beyond is seen a
residential suburban quarter, well wooded and with ample
shrubberies. A gravelled path leads from the gate to the porch,
or sun-room, where are broad steps. Upon the lawn are a white
garden bench, a table, and a great green-and-white-striped sun
umbrella, with several white garden chairs.
Autumn has come, and the foliage is beginning to turn; but the
scene is warm and sunlit.
After a moment a young housemaid brings out a tray with a
chocolate pot, wafers, and one cup and saucer and a lace-edged
napkin. She places the tray on the table, moves a chair to it,
looks at the tray thoughtfully, turns, starts toward the
house--when_ GIBSON _comes out. He wears a travelling suit and
is bareheaded._
ELLA: The cook thought you might like a cup of chocolate after a long
trip like that--just getting off the train and all, Mr. Gibson.
GIBSON: Thank you, Ella, I should.
ELLA: I'll bring your mail right out.
[_She goes into the house and returns with a packet of
letters._]
GIBSON: Thanks, Ella!
ELLA: Everything is there that's come since you sent the telegram not to
forward any more.
GIBSON: It's pleasant to find the house and everything just as I left
it.
ELLA: My, Mr. Gibson, we pretty near thought you wasn't never coming
back. Those June roses in that bed round yonder lasted pretty near up
into August this year, Mr. Gibson. For that matter it's such mild
weather even yet some say we won't have any fall till Thanksgiving.
GIBSON: Yes, it's extraordinary.
ELLA: Shall I leave the tray?
GIBSON: No; you can take it. [_She moves to do so._] Wait a minute.
Here's a letter from John Riley, up at the factory. Don't I remember his
son Tom coming here to see you quite a good deal?
ELLA: Yes, sir; Tom's one of the factory truckmen like his father. He
still comes to see me quite a good deal, sir. There isn't anything about
that in the letter, is there, sir? [_She knows there isn't._]
GIBSON [_absently_]: No, no! [_With faint irony._] He only wants to know
about where to get a stock of truck parts that had been ordered before I
broke connections with the factory. He thinks four months is a long time
for them to be on the way and doesn't know where to write.
ELLA: He's a terrible active man, Mr. Riley. Always pushing.
GIBSON: So Tom comes round more than ever, does he?
ELLA [_coyly_]: He does, sir!
GIBSON: I'm not going to lose you, am I, Ella?
ELLA: Well, sir, up to the time of that change in the factory we hadn't
expected we could get married for maybe two years yet, but the way
things are now--not that I want to leave here, sir--but it does look
like going right ahead with the wedding!
GIBSON: Tom feels that prosperous, does he?
ELLA: I guess he _is_ prosperous, sir!
GIBSON [_gravely digesting this_]: Well, I suppose I'm glad to hear it.
ELLA: Yes, sir; everybody's glad these days up at the factory, sir. I
don't mean about just Tom and me, they're glad.
GIBSON: You mean they're all in a glad condition?
ELLA: Oh, _are_ they, sir! Even the Commiskeys got an automobile last
month!
GIBSON: Well, I suppose that's splendid.
ELLA: Didn't you know about it, sir?
GIBSON: No, not a word. I've been pretty deep up in the Maine woods this
summer. Have you been over to the factory at all yourself, Ella?
ELLA: Yes, sir; visitors can go round just as they like to. They're glad
to have you.
GIBSON: When you've been over there, Ella--you know which one is Miss
Gorodna, don't you?
ELLA: Oh, yes, sir! She's one of the best in managing, Miss Gorodna.
GIBSON: You--did you--have you happened to see her?
ELLA: Yes, sir, once or twice.
GIBSON: Did she--ah--did she look overworked?
ELLA: Oh, I shouldn't say so, sir.
GIBSON: She looked well, then?
ELLA: Yes, indeed, sir! Everybody's so happy up there; I don't suppose
none of 'em could look happier than she is, sir!
GIBSON: They are all happy, then?
ELLA [_laughing joyfully_]: You never see such times in your life, sir!
[_A bell rings in the house._] I'll answer the bell.
GIBSON: I've finished this, Ella.
ELLA: Yes, sir. [_She takes the tray and goes into the house._ GIBSON
_opens another letter, reads it._ ELLA _returns._]
ELLA: It's Mr. Mifflin, sir.
GIBSON: All right.
[MIFFLIN, _beaming and bubbling, more radiant than in Act 1,
but dressed as then except for a change of tie, comes from the
house. He carries his umbrella and hat and the same old
magazines and a newspaper._]
MIFFLIN: Ah, Mr. Gibson, you couldn't stay away any longer!
GIBSON: How de do! Sit down!
MIFFLIN [_effervescing, as they sit_]: It's glorious! I heard from your
household you were expected back this Sunday. Now confess! You couldn't
stay away! You had to come and watch it!
GIBSON: Well, I've not had to come and watch it for four months. I don't
expect to watch it much, now.
MIFFLIN: You don't mean to sit there and tell me you don't know
anything about it!
GIBSON: No; I don't know anything about it.
MIFFLIN: Mr. Gibson, you're an extraordinary man!
GIBSON: No, I'm not. What I did was extraordinary, but I was only an
ordinary man pushed into a hole.
MIFFLIN: Oh, no; surrendering the factory was merely normal. What's
remarkable is your staying away from watching the glorious work these
former hireling workmen of your factory are doing, now they've won their
industrial freedom. Myself, I've taken rooms near by: I started to do
one article; now I have a series. And oh, the glory of watching these
comrades with their economic shackles off! Haven't you heard anything of
our success?
GIBSON: Only a word from my housemaid.
MIFFLIN [_delightedly, pinning him_]: Aha! There! What did she say?
"Only a word"; but what was IT?
GIBSON: It indicated--prosperity.
MIFFLIN: Ah! Immense prosperity, didn't it?
GIBSON: I suppose so. Success, at any rate.
MIFFLIN: Success? It's so magnificent that now it's inevitable for
every factory of every kind all over this country.
GIBSON: All over the country?
MIFFLIN: Not only all over this country! The world must do it. Ah,
they've done it in a country larger than this already! And these
comrades right here are showing our country what it means. I don't
begrudge you some credit for having begun it, Mr. Gibson. But you only
anticipated what all owners everywhere are going to have to do before
the workmen simply _take_ the factories. They're going to take them
because they have the inherent right; and they're going to take them
_now_, either by direct action or by the technical owners, like
yourself, seeing the handwriting on the wall.
GIBSON: What do you mean by direct action?
MIFFLIN: Why, just taking them!
GIBSON: By force?
MIFFLIN [_deprecatingly but affably_]: Oh, we hope the theoretical
owners won't reduce them to such extremes. There might be a few cases
that law-abiding citizens would regret; but that isn't the big thing.
Our work here is so far perhaps on the small scale, but it shows--it
shows--that everything must be on a cooeperative basis!
GIBSON: Everything? My house, too?
MIFFLIN [_beaming_]: Your house, too.
GIBSON [_amiably_]: How about your gold eyeglasses?
MIFFLIN [_laughing_]: Those will be given me by the state. But
seriously, aren't you coming to pay us a visit at the factory?
GIBSON: Since you ask me--what's the best time? I suppose the whistle
doesn't blow as early as it used to.
MIFFLIN [_laughing pityingly_]: Whistle! Oh, my dear sir! This only
confirms me in my old idea that the technical owners didn't have
practical minds. You don't suppose we abolished you, and then didn't
abolish the whistle? That whistle hurt self-respect. Really I'm sorry
it's Sunday and I can't take you over there this minute to see the great
changes. Talk about collectivism! That factory is the most interesting
place in the world to-day. When the men were working eight long hours a
day under a master it was all repression, reserve; their individualities
were stifled. Now they expand!
GIBSON: You mean they talk a good deal?
MIFFLIN: I never have been in a place where there was so much talk in my
life. They talk all the time; it shows they are thinking.
GIBSON: Isn't it noisy?
MIFFLIN [_delighted_]: It is! Every man has his own ideas and he
expresses them. It means a freshness and originality in the work that
never got into it before.
GIBSON [_worried_]: Originality? You don't mean to say they've changed
any of the features of The Gibson Upright.
MIFFLIN: Oh, no; it's the same piano--and yet different! I almost feel I
could tell the difference by looking at one. There's no change; yet now
it has character. And those men--those men, Mr. Gibson--it's brought out
_their_ character so! They're thinking all the time.
GIBSON: They're working, too, of course?
MIFFLIN: Working! You never saw men work under the old capitalistic
regime, Mr. Gibson! Don't think that this work is the driven, dogged
thing it was when they had to. This is work with dignity, with
enthusiasm, with spontaneity!
GIBSON [_rising, very thoughtful_]: Well, I ought to hope that it is, of
course!
[_He walks to and fro a moment, then comes and rests his hands
on the back of a chair, looking at_ MIFFLIN.]
Mr. Mifflin, I went into this with open eyes. I was angry at the time,
but I had thought of it often. And when I went out I went out! Now I've
kept away and I don't intend to do any prying--as a matter of fact, I'm
only back here for two or three days--but I have some natural curiosity,
especially about certain particulars.
MIFFLIN: Everything is as open as the sunlight--no capitalistic secret
machinations. Ask anything you like!
GIBSON: Well, then, do you happen to know what are the profits for these
four months?
MIFFLIN: Frankly, that's a detail I don't know. But I do know that
everyone is delighted and that the profits have been large.
GIBSON: And no friction among the men?
MIFFLIN: No--I--no, none at all; no friction; nothing that could be
called friction at all.
GIBSON: Then it's a complete success?
MIFFLIN: Absolutely! Why, just let me picture it to you, Mr. Gibson.
Don't you understand, these men are not hirelings now; they're comrades,
a brotherhood! You should see them as they come from the factory in the
warm afternoon sunshine. They stop in groups and continue discussions of
matters of interest that have come up during the day. You hear the most
eager discussion, such spirited repartee; and in the factory itself
these groups gather at any time. When there may be some tiny bit of
friction it is disposed of amicably, comrade to comrade. And some of the
wives of the workmen have taken the greatest interest! Imagine under the
capitalistic regime a wife coming and sitting at her husband's side and
taking up little matters of importance with him, as a wife should, while
he worked! Oh, the wives have caught the idea, too! They're
proprietresses just as much as their husbands are proprietors. And you
can see how keenly they feel the responsibility and want to share in
settling all questions that come up. Then they walk home with their
husbands, talking it all over. Mr. Gibson, I tell you, sometimes it has
moved me. More than once I have found my eyes moistening as I watched
it.
GIBSON: And do you happen to know--well, haven't the men felt the need
for a certain kind of general management of the institution's affairs?
MIFFLIN: Oh, that's all met--all met by meetings of the governing board,
the committee.
GIBSON: No; I meant, hasn't any need been felt for a man with a certain
specialized knowledge? Say, for instance, to deal with the purchasing
of raw materials?
MIFFLIN [_somewhat vague and puzzled_]: I think they did do this through
an individual for a time. I think the head bookkeeper was given charge
of such matters; at least I think so. But probably they found that the
creation of such an office was unnecessary. Purely clerical work. At
least I haven't seen him about for several weeks.
GIBSON: Was he there on just one share of the profits?
MIFFLIN: Why, of course! That is the _sine qua non_.
GIBSON [_thoughtfully_]: I see. [_Paces up and down and halts again._]
So you say everybody is happy?
MIFFLIN: Radiant!
GIBSON: Everybody?
MIFFLIN [_beaming_]: Come and see!
GIBSON: Ah--Miss Gorodna seems to like it all, does she?
MIFFLIN: _Does_ she!
GIBSON [_a little falsely_]: None of them are happier than she is, I
suppose?
MIFFLIN: Miss Gorodna is the radiant, joyous sunshine of the whole
place!
GIBSON [_somewhat ruefully_]: Well, that's pleasant news.
[ELLA _appears from the house._]
ELLA: It's that old Ed Carter from the factory, Mr. Gibson. He heard
from Tom Riley you was expected back and he's come to call on you.
GIBSON: Tell him to come right out. [_Sees_ CARTER _beyond_ ELLA.] Come
out here, Carter! Glad to see you!
[_They shake hands._ CARTER _is unchanged as to head and
whiskers, but wears a square-cut black frock coat, or "Prince
Albert," with trousers and waistcoat of the same material; old
brown shoes, a derby hat, a blue satin four-in-hand tie._]
CARTER: How do you do, Mr. Gibson! I just thought I'd pay my respects,
as Tom Riley passed the word round the factory you was coming back.
GIBSON: Sit down, sit down!
MIFFLIN [_exuberantly_]: How do you do, Carter, how do you do! [_They
shake hands and_ MIFFLIN _pats_ CARTER _on the shoulder._] Look at him,
Mr. Gibson! Look at him! Don't you see what the New Freedom has done for
him? It's in his eye! That pride of liberty! It's in his step, in every
gesture he makes. [CARTER _strokes his whiskers._] You're old
friends--equal now, equal at last. I won't disturb you! [_Picks up his
hat, magazines, and umbrella._] He can give you more than I can, Mr.
Gibson. Good afternoon! Good afternoon!
[_He goes out through the gate._]
GIBSON: Sit down, Carter. Sit down! [_They sit._] Well, is everything
fine?
CARTER [_heartily_]: Yes, sir! It is, Mr. Gibson! Indeed it is!
[_Glances with some little pride at his clothes._] I couldn't of
expected no finer. Fact is, I never could of asked for anything like
this, even if I'd been a praying man.
GIBSON: Well, I'm glad to hear it, Carter!
CARTER: I knowed you would be, Mr. Gibson. It's all just wonderful the
way things are working out!
GIBSON: Everything is working out just right, is it?
CARTER: Oh, I don't say everything! They's bound to be some little mites
here and there. You know that yourself.
GIBSON [_grimly_]: Yes, I do! What are _your_ little mites, Carter?
CARTER: Well, what mostly gits my goat is this here Simpson's wife, Mrs.
Simpson.
GIBSON: What bothers you about Simpson's wife?
CARTER: Well, what I says, woman's place is the home, and this here Mrs.
Simpson--I--I never could stand no loud, gabby woman!
GIBSON: You're not neighbours, are you?
CARTER: No! She spends all her days at the factory; you might think she
was running the whole place! What's worse'n that, you know they elected
me chairman o' the governing committee, and she's all the time trying to
'lectioneer me out. What she wants is to git Simpson in for chairman;
that'd be jest same's her bein' chairman herself, the way she runs
Simpson! That's the only thing that worries me. Everything else is just
splendid, splendid!
GIBSON: I understand you don't blow the whistle any more. What hours are
you working now?
CARTER: Well, first we thought we ought to work about six; but we got on
such a good basis a good many of them are talkin' how they think that's
too much. It'd suit me either way. _That_ ain't the trouble over at that
factory, Mr. Gibson.
GIBSON: What is the trouble over at that factory?
CARTER [_with feeling_]: Mr. Gibson, it's the inequality. Look at me
now, and look at Simpson. Simpson and his wife haven't got a child, and
I got seven, every one of 'em to support, and my married daughter lost
her husband and got a shock, and I got her and her three little ones
pretty much on my hands. And Simpson draws down every cent as much as
what I do; just exactly the same. And if the truth was told he don't
work as much as what I do. Then, look at them bachelors; they ain't got
_nobody_ to support! Well, that's got to be settled!
GIBSON: How are you going to settle it?
CARTER [_cheerfully_]: Oh, the committee meetin' settles everything by
vote. I'd of put a motion about these matters at some o' the meetings
long ago except I'm chairman and they worked a rule on me the chairman
can't put motions. But some of us got it fixed up to git it put over at
the meeting to-morrow. That's the _big_ meeting to-morrow--the monthly
one. Don't misunderstand me, Mr. Gibson; I ain't makin' no complaint
about these here details, because everything else is so splendid and
prosperous it seems like this here New Dawn Mr. Mifflin called it in his
article.
GIBSON: Nothing else worries you then, Carter?
CARTER: Nothing else in the world, Mr. Gibson. Except there might be
some of 'em don't take their responsibilities the way I could wish.
Fact is, there's so much talkin' gits to goin' over there sometimes you
can't hear yourself work. Me? I'm an honest worker, if I work for you or
work for myself. But I can't claim they're all that way. Some that used
to loaf, you can't claim they don't loaf more than they did; yes, sir!
GIBSON: They get just the same as you do, though, don't they?
CARTER: Oh, yes! That's the _sinee que none_; it's the brotherhood
between comrades. I don't mean to complain, but they's one thing that
don't look to me just fair. It took me four years to learn my trade and
I'm a skilled workman, and now some Hunnyacks that just sends strips
along through a chute--and it's all they do know how to do--they used to
git two and a half a day to my six, but this way we both git just the
same. I says something about it didn't seem right to me, and one them
Hunnyacks called me a boor-jaw. Well, then I talked to Miss Gorodna
about it.
GIBSON: What did Miss Gorodna say?
CARTER: Miss Gorodna says: "But you both get enough, don't you?"
GIBSON: Well, don't you?
CARTER [_scratching his head_]: Yes, plenty; and it _sounds_ all right,
them and me gittin' the same; but I can't just seem to work it out in my
mind how it _is_ right. [_Cheering up._] Mr. Mifflin says himself,
though, it's just wonderful! And we certainly are makin' great money!
GIBSON: Then all you poor are getting rich?
CARTER: Yes; looks like we will be.
[_During these speeches_ NORA _has appeared, or rather her head
and shoulders have, above the hedge. She has come along the
hedge and now stands halting at the gate. She wears a becoming
autumn dress and hat, in excellent taste; carries a slim
umbrella. She has a beautifully bound book in her hand._]
NORA [_opening the gate_]: Do you mind my coming in the side gate, Mr.
Gibson?
[GIBSON, _startled by her voice, turns abruptly from_ CARTER
_to stare at her, speaks after a pause, slowly._]
GIBSON: No, I don't mind what gate you come in.
NORA [_coming down to join them_]: How do you do! [_Gives him her
hand._]
GIBSON: How do you do!
CARTER [_on the other side of her_]: How do you do, Miss Gorodna!
NORA [_for a brief moment confused that she has not noticed_ Carter]:
Oh--oh, how do you do, Mr. Carter! [_Turns and shakes hands with him.
She turns again, facing_ GIBSON.] I just heard you were here. I wanted
to bring you this copy of Montaigne--if you'll forgive me for keeping it
a year.
GIBSON: I gave it to you. Don't you--remember?
NORA: Yes, I--remember. But things were different then. Please. I think
I oughtn't to keep it now. [_He takes it, places it gently upon the
table; they sit facing each other; she speaks more cheerfully and
briskly._] I came to see you on a matter of business, too.
CARTER: Well, then, I'll just be--
NORA: Oh, no! Please stay, Mr. Carter! It's a factory matter. [CARTER
_coughs and sits._ NORA _continues, not pausing for that._] It was about
that great stock of wire you had your purchasing agent buy just before
the--before you went away, Mr. Gibson.
GIBSON: I'm glad to see you looking so well, Miss Gorodna.
NORA: Thank you! If you remember, you must have ordered him to buy all
the wire of our grade that was in the market at that time. At any rate,
we found ourselves in possession of an enormous stock that would have
lasted us about three years.
GIBSON: Yes. That's what I wanted.
NORA: As it happened it turned out to be a very good investment, Mr.
Gibson, because in less than a month it had gained about nine per cent.
in value, and three weeks ago a man came to us and offered to take it
off our hands at a price giving us a twenty-two per cent. profit!
GIBSON: Yes; I should think he would.
NORA: So of course we sold it.
GIBSON [_checks an exclamation, merely saying_]: Did you?
NORA: Naturally we did! Twenty-two per cent. profit in that short time!
Now it just happens that we've got to buy some more ourselves, and we
can't get hold of any, even at the price that we sold it, because it
seems to have kept going up. I thought perhaps you might know where to
get some at the price you bought the other, and you mightn't mind
telling us.
GIBSON: No; I wouldn't mind telling you. I'd like to tell you.
NORA: You think there isn't any?
GIBSON: I'm sure there isn't any.
NORA: Then I'm afraid we'll have to get some back from the people we
sold to. Of course I'm anxious to show the great financial improvement
as well as other improvements. That's partly my province and Mr.
Carter's, our committee chairman, besides our regular work.
GIBSON: Mr. Mifflin tells me that you had a sort of general manager for
a while at first.
CARTER: Oh, that was Hill, the head bookkeeper. He left. He was a
traitor to the comrades.
GIBSON: Hill? He knew quite a little about the business. Why did he
leave?
CARTER: Why, that Coles-Hibbard factory went and offered him a big
salary to come over there; more than he thought he could get cooeperatin'
with us.
NORA: Hill was always a capitalist at heart. We certainly haven't needed
him!
CARTER: Oh, everybody was glad to get rid of Hill! Better off without
him--better off without him!
GIBSON: I suppose it was really an economy, his going?
NORA [_smiling_]: It resulted in economy.
GIBSON: Have you made many economies?
NORA: Oh, a great many!
CARTER: Oh, my! Yes!
NORA: Economies! [_Her manner now is indulgent, amused, friendly, almost
pitying._] Mr. Gibson, have you any realization of what you threw away
at that place? Don't be afraid, I'll never bring you the figures. I
wouldn't do such a thing to anybody!
GIBSON: Do you think I was too lavish?
NORA: We couldn't believe it at first. Just what was being thrown away
on advertising, for instance. The bill you paid for the last month you
were there was five thousand dollars!
CARTER: That was the figger! It's certainly a good one on you, Mr.
Gibson.
NORA: We cut that five thousand dollars down to _three hundred_! That
was one item of forty-seven hundred dollars a month saved. Just one
item!
CARTER [_hilariously_]: Quite some item!
NORA [_seriously and gently_]: Five thousand dollars a month to
advertise a piano that sells for only a hundred and eighty-eight
dollars!
CARTER: That's the facts!
NORA: Mr. Gibson, did you really ever have any idea what you were
paying in commissions to agents?
GIBSON: Yes, I did.
NORA: Why, I can't believe it! Did you know that you paid them twenty
per cent. on each piano? Over thirty-seven dollars!
GIBSON: Yes.
NORA: But wasn't it thrown away? I can't understand how you kept the
factory going so long as you did, with such losses. Why, don't you know
it amounts to hundreds of thousands of dollars a year? When we found it
out we couldn't see how you made both ends meet, and we thought there
must have been some mistake, and you'd never realized what advantage
these agents were taking of you.
GIBSON: Yes, I knew what they got.
NORA [_triumphantly_]: We cut those commissions from thirty-seven
dollars--to _twelve_! And that's just one more item among our economies.
Now do you wonder at the success we're making?
GIBSON: And your profits have been--satisfactory?
NORA: The very first month our profits were _four thousand dollars_ more
than the last month you were there!
GIBSON: That's the month you say you cut out four thousand seven
hundred dollars' worth of advertising.
NORA: And the next month we cut down the commissions, and the profits
were _five_ thousand more!
GIBSON: But those were returns under the old commissions.
NORA: But last month, with new economies, we showed a larger profit than
you had!
GIBSON: And this month?
NORA: We shan't know that until the report's read at the meeting
to-morrow. I think it will be the largest profit of all.
CARTER: That bookkeeper's workin' on it to-day. Talked like he was going
to cut us down two or three thousand, mebbe. [_Laughing._] That's the
way he always talks.
NORA: He isn't a good influence.
CARTER: No--too gloomy, too gloomy to suit me!
GIBSON: What about the two other bookkeepers?
CARTER: The committee voted them into the packing department; and they
ain't much good even there. It's a crime!
NORA: They weren't needed. Our bookkeeping is so simplified since you
left!
GIBSON: It all seems to be simplified, Miss Gorodna.
NORA: Yes; and whatever problems come up, they're all settled at our
meetings.
[_A sound of squabbling is heard upon the street, growing
louder as the people engaging in it approach along the
sidewalk._]
CARTER: There's one we got to bring up and do something about at the
meetin' to-morrow.
GIBSON: What is it? [CARTER _goes up to the gate._]
NORA: It's that Mrs. Simpson; she's a great nuisance.
CARTER: Yes, it's her and Simpson and Frankel. The Simpsons moved into a
flat right up in this neighbourhood. Quite some of the comrades live up
round here now.
[FRANKEL _and_ MRS. SIMPSON _are heard disputing as they
approach: "Well, what you goin' to do about it!" "I'll show you
what we're goin' to do about it!" "You can't do nothing!" "You
wait till to-morrow and see." "I got my rights, ain't I?" and
so on._]
SIMPSON [_heard remonstrating_]: Now, Mamie, Mamie! Frankel, you
oughtn't to talk to Mamie that way.
[GIBSON, _interested and amused, goes part way up to the
hedge._ NORA _is somewhat mortified as the disputants reach the
gate._ GIBSON _speaks to them._]
GIBSON: How do you do, Simpson! How do you do, Mrs. Simpson! How do you
do, Frankel! Won't you come in and argue here?
MRS. SIMPSON: Wha'd you say, Mr. Gibson?
GIBSON: I said come in; come in!
SIMPSON [_uncertainly_]: Well, I don't know.
GIBSON: Come in! Nobody here but friends of yours. Sit down. I'd like to
hear what the argument was about.
[MRS. SIMPSON _is a large woman, domineering and noisy, dressed
somewhat expensively. She is proud of some new furs and a pair
of quite fancy shoes._ SIMPSON _has a new suit of clothes and a
gold-headed cane._
FRANKEL _wears a cheap cutaway suit and is smoking a cigar._]
MRS. SIMPSON: I don't care who hears the argument! Right's right and
wrong's wrong!
FRANKEL: You bet right's right, and so's my rights right!
MRS. SIMPSON: You ain't got any rights.
FRANKEL [_hotly to everybody_]: Do you hear she says I ain't got no
rights at all?
MRS. SIMPSON: You ain't got the rights you claim you got.
FRANKEL: She comes down there and tries to run the whole factory. Ask
any of 'em if she don't. Ask Carter!
MRS. SIMPSON: I own that factory just as much as anybody does.
SIMPSON: Now, Frankel, you be careful what you say to Mamie!
FRANKEL: I got shares in that factory and by rights ought to have as
many votes at the meetin' as I got shares--let alone your talking about
trying to root me out of my profits!
GIBSON: What's this about Frankel having shares?
FRANKEL [_violently_]: You bet your life I got shares! And I'm going to
have my shares of the money at that meetin' to-morrow!
MRS. SIMPSON: You bet your life you ain't!
SIMPSON: You think we're goin' to vote all our profits away to you?
CARTER: Wait a minute! Ain't I the chairman of that--
MRS. SIMPSON: You may be chairman yet--but not long!
FRANKEL [_sharply to_ CARTER]: You just try to rule me out once!
GIBSON: What's it all about?
MRS. SIMPSON: I'll soon enough tell anybody what it's about!
FRANKEL: You couldn't tell nothing straight!
CARTER [_deprecatingly_]: Now, now, this here's just one of our little
side difficulties, you might say. What's the use to git huffy over it,
we're gittin' along so well and all? The trouble is, some o' the men and
their families ain't been used to so much prosperity and money in the
house that way, all of a sudden. Of course some of 'em got to living too
high and run into some debt and everything.
FRANKEL: Well, what business is that of yours? The factory ain't a Home,
is it? And you ain't the Matron, are you?
CARTER: I don't claim such!
FRANKEL: It's my business, ain't it, if I take and live on the cheaps
and put by for a rainy day, and happen to have money when other people
need it from me?
SIMPSON: _That_ much may be your business, but I reckon it was our
business when you come blowin' round the factory, first that you owned
seven shares besides your own; then, a week after, you says seventeen;
then--
GIBSON: Well, how many shares has he got?
SIMPSON: He was claimin' twenty-four yesterday.
MRS. SIMPSON [_violently_]: He's bought two more since last night. Now
he claims twenty-six!
FRANKEL: Yes; and I _own_ twenty-six!
CARTER: That ain't never goin' to do! I don't say it's a condition as
you might say we exactly see how to handle right now, but the way it is,
you certainly got us all disturbed up and hard to git at the rights of
it. You claimin' all them shares--
FRANKEL: Well, my goodness, you git the _work_ fer them shares, don't
you? What you yelpin' about?
CARTER: I don't say we don't git the same amount o' work, but--
FRANKEL: Well, _how_ you git it, that's my lookout, ain't it, so it's
done?
CARTER: But you claim you got a right to draw out twenty-six profits!
FRANKEL: Sure I do when I furnish the labour for twenty-six. Am I
crazy?
CARTER: But that way you're makin' more than any ten men put together in
the whole factory!
FRANKEL: Ain't it just? What you goin' to do about it?
[_During this speech_ SHOMBERG _has come along the street and
stands looking over the gate._]
CARTER: Well, so fur, we ain't been able to see how to argue with you.
It don't look right, and yet it's hard to find jest what to say to you.
FRANKEL: You bet it is!
CARTER: 'Course, that's one of the points that's got to be settled at
the meeting to-morrow.
FRANKEL: You bet it'll be settled!
MRS. SIMPSON: If we had another kind of a chairman it'd been settled
long ago, and settled right!
CARTER: Now look here, Mrs. Simpson--
FRANKEL [_passionately_]: I got twenty-six shares, and I earned 'em,
too! [_To_ GIBSON.] Look at the trouble they make me--to git my legal
rights, let alone the rest the trouble I got! [_Fiercely to_ CARTER _and
to_ SIMPSON]: Yes, I had twenty-four shares yesterday and I got
twenty-six to-day! and I might have another by to-night. Don't think
I'm the only one that's got sense enough not to go smearin' his money
all round on cheap limousines and Queen Anne dinin'-room sets at
eighty-nine dollars per! [_Dramatically pointing at_ SHOMBERG]: There's
a man worth four shares right now! He had three and he bought Mitchell's
out last night at Steinwitz's pool room. Ask him whether he thinks I got
a right to my twenty-six profits or not!
SHOMBERG: You bet your life!
MRS. SIMPSON: I guess that Dutchman hasn't got the say-so, has he?
FRANKEL: No. _You_ run the factory now, Mrs. Simpson!
CARTER: Now look here; this ain't very much like comrades, is it, all
this arguin'? Sunday, too!
FRANKEL: Oh, I'm tryin' to be friendly!
CARTER [_to_ GIBSON]: This buyin' of shares and all has kind of
introduced a sort of an undesirable element into the factory, you might
say. That's kind of the bothersome side of it, and it can't be denied we
would have quite a good deal of bothersomeness if it wasn't for our
meeting.
NORA [_to everybody except_ GIBSON]: Don't you all think that these
arguments are pretty foolish when you know that nothing can be settled
except at the governing committee's meeting?
SIMPSON: That's so, Miss Gorodna. What's more, it don't look like as
good comrades as it ought to. I don't want to have no trouble with
Frankel. He might have the rights of it for all I know. Anyways, if he
hasn't I ain't got the brains to make out the case against him, and
anyways, as you say, the meetin' settles all them things.
NORA: Don't you think you and Frankel might shake hands now, like good
comrades?
FRANKEL [_with hostility_]: Sure, I'll shake hands with him!
SIMPSON: Well, I just as soon.
MRS. SIMPSON: Don't you do it, Henry!
SIMPSON: Well, but he's a comrade.
MRS. SIMPSON: Well, you can't help that! You don't have to shake hands
with him.
SIMPSON: Well, consider it done, Frankel. Consider it done!
CARTER: That's right, that's right! We can leave it to the meeting.
SHOMBERG: You bet you can! You goin' my way, Frankel?
[FRANKEL, _joining him, speaks to_ MRS. SIMPSON.]
FRANKEL: I s'pose you're going to come to the meetin', Mrs. Simpson?
MRS. SIMPSON: Ain't my place where my husband is?
FRANKEL: Well, you don't git no vote!
MRS. SIMPSON: There's goin' to be a motion introduced for the wives _to_
vote.
FRANKEL: Watch it pass! Good-bye, Mr. Gibson!
[GIBSON _nods._ FRANKEL _goes away with_ SHOMBERG.]
SIMPSON: Good-bye, Mr. Gibson! All this don't amount to much. It'll all
be settled to-morrow.
MRS. SIMPSON: Good-bye, Mr. Gibson! [_And as they go out the gate_]: You
bet your life it'll be settled! If that wall-eyed runt thinks he can
walk over _me_--
CARTER [_looking after them, laughing_]: Well, she's an awful
interfering woman! And she ain't the only one. If they'd all stay home
like my wife things would be smoother, I guess. Still, they're smooth
enough. [_Going_]: If you want to see that, Mr. Gibson, we'll be glad to
have you look in at the meeting. You're always welcome at the factory
and it'd be a treat to you to see how things work out. It's at eleven
o'clock if you'd like to come.
GIBSON: Thanks, Carter.
CARTER: Well, good afternoon, Mr. Gibson and Miss Gorodna. Good evening,
I should say, I reckon.
GIBSON: Good evening, Carter.
[_The light has grown to be of sunset._ CARTER _goes._]
NORA [_going toward the gate_]: I'm glad to see you looking so well.
Good evening!
GIBSON: Oh, just a minute more.
NORA: Well?
GIBSON: It looks as if that might be a lively meeting to-morrow.
NORA: Is that the old capitalistic sneer?
GIBSON: Indeed it's not! It only seemed to me from what we've just heard
here--
NORA [_bitterly_]: Oh, I suppose all business men's meetings and
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