by Sapper
It seemed to Vane almost as if he had received a blow – so sudden was the check to his mental rambling. For the eyes of the man opposite, deep-set and gleaming, were the eyes of greatness, and they triumphed so completely over their indifferent setting that Vane marvelled at his previous obtuseness. Martyrs have had such eyes, and the great pioneers of the world – men who have deemed everything well lost for a cause, be that cause right or wrong. And almost as if he were standing there in the flesh, there came to him a vision of Sir James raving furiously against this man.
He watched him with a slightly puzzled frown for a moment. This was the man who was deliberately leading the masses towards discontent and revolt; this was the man of intellect who was deliberately using his gift to try to ruin the country… So Sir James had said; so Vane had always understood. And his frown grew more puzzled.
Suddenly Ramage turned and spoke to him. A faint smile hovered for a second around his lips, as if he had noticed the frown and interpreted its cause aright.
“Things seem to be going very well over the water, Captain Vane.”
“Very well,” said Vane abruptly. “I think we’ve got those arch swine beaten at last – without the help of a negotiated peace.”
For a moment the deep-set eyes gleamed, and then, once more, a faint smile hovered on his face. “Of which much maligned substitute for war you doubtless regard me as one of the High Priests?”
“Such is the general opinion, Mr Ramage.”
“And you think,” returned the other after a moment, “that the idea was so completely wrong as to have justified the holders of the opposite view expending – what, another two…three million lives?…”
“I am afraid,” answered Vane a little curtly, “that I’m in no position to balance any such account. The issues involved are a little above my form. All I do know is, that our dead would have turned in their graves had we not completed their work…”
“I wonder?” said the other slowly. “It always seems to me that the dead are saddled with very bloodthirsty opinions… One sometimes thinks, when one is in a particularly foolish mood, that the dead might have learned a little common sense… Very optimistic, but still…”
“If they have learned anything,” answered Vane gravely, “our dead over the water – they have learned the sublime lesson of pulling together. It seems a pity, Mr Ramage, that a few of ’em can’t come back again and preach the sermon here in England.”
“Wouldn’t it be too wonderful?” chirruped their hostess. “Think of going to St Paul’s and being preached to by a ghost…” For the past minute she had been shooting little bird-like glances at a neighbouring table, and now she leaned forward impressively. “There are some people over there, Mr Ramage, and I’m sure they recognise you.” This was better, far better, than feeding a hen in the drawing-room.
He turned to her with a faintly amused smile. “How very annoying for you! I am so sorry… Shall I go away, and then you can discuss my sins in a loud voice with Captain Vane?”
Nancy Smallwood shook an admonishing finger at him, and sighed pathetically. “Do go on talking, you two. I do so love to hear about these things, and I’m so stupid myself…”
“For Heaven’s sake, Nancy,” laughed Vane, “don’t put me amongst the highbrows. I’m groping…crumbs from rich man’s table sort of business.”
“Groping?” Ramage glanced at him across the table.
“Yes,” said Vane taking the bull by the horns. “Wondering why the devil we fought if the result is going to be anarchy in England. Over there everybody seems to be pals; here… Great Scott!” He shrugged his shoulders. After a while he went on – “Over there we got rid of class hatred; may I ask you, Mr Ramage, without meaning in any way to be offensive, why you’re doing your utmost to stir it up over here?”
The other put down his knife and fork and stared at Vane thoughtfully, “Because,” be remarked in a curiously deep voice, “that way lies the salvation of the world…”
“The machine-gun at the street corner,” answered Vane cynically, “is certainly the way to salvation for quite a number.”
Ramage took no notice of the interruption. “If Labour had controlled Europe in 1914, do you suppose we should have had a war? As it was, a few men were capable of ordering millions to their death. Can you seriously contend that such a state of affairs was not absolutely rotten?”
“But are you going to alter it by fanning class hatred?” demanded Vane going back to his old point.
“Not if it can be avoided. But – the issue lies in the hands of the present ruling class…”
Vane raised his eyebrows. “I have generally understood that it was Labour who was bringing things to a head.”
“It rather depends on the way you look at it, doesn’t it? If I possess a thing which by right is yours, and you demand the return of it, which of us two is really responsible for the subsequent fight?”
“And what does the present ruling class possess which Labour considers should be returned to it?” asked Vane curiously.
“The bond note of slavery,” returned the other. “If the present rulers will tear up that bond – willingly and freely – there will be no fight… If not…” He shrugged his shoulders. “Labour may be forcing that issue, Captain Vane; but it will be the other man who is responsible if the fight comes… Labour demands fair treatment – not as a concession, but as a right – and Labour has felt its power. It will get that treatment – peacefully, if possible; but if not” – and a light blazed in his eyes – “it will get it by force.”
“And the referee as to what is just is Labour itself,” said Vane slowly; “in spite of the fact that it’s the other man who is running the financial risk and paying the piper. It sounds wonderfully fair, doesn’t it? Surely some rights must go with property – whether it’s land or a coal mine, or a bucket shop… Surely the owner must have the principal say in calling the tune.” For a few moments he stared at the man opposite him, and then he went on again, with increasing earnestness – with almost a note of appeal in his voice. “I want to get at your point of view, Mr Ramage – I want to understand you… And I don’t. There are thousands of men like me who have been through this war – who have seen the glory underneath the dirt – who want to understand too. We hoped – we still hope – that a new England would grow out of it; but somehow…” Vane laughed shortly, and took out his cigarette case.
“And we are going to get that new England for which you have fought,” burst out the other triumphantly. Then with a slight smile he looked at Vane. “We must not forget our surroundings – I see a waiter regarding me suspiciously. Thanks – no; I don’t smoke.” He traced a pattern idly on the cloth for a moment, and then looked up quickly. “I would like you to try to understand,” he said. “Because, as I said, the whole question of possible anarchy as opposed to a constitutional change lies in your hands and the hands of your class.”
Vane gave a short, incredulous laugh, and shook his head.
“In your hands,” repeated the other gravely. “You see, Captain Vane we approach this matter from a fundamentally different point of view. You look around you, and you see men striking here and striking there. And you say ‘Look at the swine; striking again!’ But there’s one thing that you fail to grasp, I think. Underneath all these strikes and violent upheavals, bursting into flame in all sorts of unexpected places – there is the volcano of a vital conflict between two fundamental ideas. Though the men hardly realise it themselves, it’s there, that conflict, all the time… And we, who see a little further than the mob, know that it’s there, and that sooner or later that conflict will end in victory for one side or the other. Which side, my friend? Yours or ours… Or both. Yours and ours… England’s.” He paused for a moment as the waiter handed him the coffee. Then he went on – “To the master-class generally there is a certain order of things, and they
can imagine nothing else. They employ workers – they pay them, or they ‘chuck’ them, as they like. They hold over them absolute power. They are kind in many cases; they help and look after their employees. But they are the masters – and the others are the men. That is the only form of society they can conceive of. Any mitigation of conditions is simply a change within the old order. That is one point of view… Now for the other.” He turned with a smile to his hostess. “I hope I’m not boring you…”
“Why, I’m thrilled to death,” she cried, hurriedly collecting her thoughts from an adjacent hat. “Do go on.”
“The other point of view is this. We do not wish for mitigation of conditions in a system which we consider wrong. We want the entire system swept away… We want the entire propertied class removed. We deny that there are any inherent rights which go with the possession of property; and even if there are, we claim that the rights of the masses far outweigh the property rights of the small minority of owners…”
“In other words,” said Vane briefly, “you claim for the masses the right to commit robbery on a large scale.”
“For just so long as that view of robbery holds, Captain Vane, for just so long will there fail to be any real co-operation between you and us. For just so long as you are convinced that your vested right is the true one, and that ours is false – for just so long will the final settlement by quiet methods be postponed. But if you make it too long the final settlement will not come by quiet means.”
“Your proposal, then, is that we should commit suicide with a good grace?” remarked Vane. “Really, Mr Ramage, it won’t do… I, personally, if I owned property, would go into the last ditch in defence of what was mine.” Into his mind there flashed Joan’s words… “It’s ours. I tell you, ours,” and he smiled grimly. “Why, in the name of fortune, I should give what I possess to a crowd of scally wags who haven’t made good, is more than I can fathom…”
“It is hardly likely to go as far as that,” said the other with a smile. “But the time is coming when we shall have a Labour Government – a Government which at heart is Socialistic. And their first move will be to nationalise all the big industries… How far will property meet them and help them? Will they fight – or will they co-operate?… It’s up to property to decide…”
“Because you will have forced the issue,” said Vane; “an issue which, I maintain, you have no right to force. Robbery is robbery, just the same whether it’s sanctioned by an Act of Parliament, or whether it’s performed by a man holding a gun at your head… Why, in God’s name, Mr Ramage, can’t we pull together for the side?…”
“With you as the leaders – the kind employers?”
“With those men as the leaders who have shown that they can lead,” said Vane doggedly. “They will come to the top in the future as they have in the past…”
“By all manner of means,” cried Ramage. “Leaders – brains – will always rise to the top; will always be rewarded more highly than mere manual labour… They will occupy more remunerative positions under the State… But the fruits of labour will only be for those who do the work – be it with their hands or be it with their heads. The profiteer must go; the private owner must go with his dole here and his dole there, generally forced from him as the result of a strike. I would be the last to say that there are not thousands of good employers – but there are also thousands of bad ones, and now labour refuses to run the risk any more.”
“And what about depreciation – fresh plant? Where’s the capital coming from?”
“Why, the State. It requires very little imagination to see how easy it would be to put away a certain sum each year for that… A question of how much you charge the final purchaser… And the profiteer goes out of the picture… That’s what we’re aiming at; that is what is coming… No more men like the gentleman sitting three tables away – just behind you; no more of the Baxters fattening on sweated labour.” His deep-set eyes were gleaming at the vision he saw, and Vane felt a sense of futility.
“Even assuming your view is right, Mr Ramage,” he remarked slowly, “do you really think that you, and the few like you, will ever hold the mob?… You may make your new England, but you’ll make it over rivers of blood, unless we all of us – you, as well as we – see through the glass a little less darkly than we do now…”
“Every great movement has its price,” returned the other, staring at him gravely.
“Price!” Vane’s laugh was short and bitter. “Have you ever seen a battalion, Mr Ramage, that has been caught under machine-gun fire?”
“And have you, Captain Vane, ever seen the hovels in which some of our workers live?”
“And you really think that by exchanging private ownership for a soulless bureaucracy you find salvation?” said Vane shortly. “You’re rather optimistic, aren’t you, on the subject of Government departments?”
“I’m not thinking of this Government, Captain Vane,” he remarked quietly. He looked at his watch and rose. “I’m glad to have met you,” he said holding out his hand. “It’s the vested interest that is at the root of the whole evil – that stands between the old order and the new. Therefore the vested interest must go.”… He turned to his hostess. “I’m sorry to run away like this, Mrs Smallwood, but – I’m a busy man…”
She rose at once; nothing would have induced her to forgo walking through the restaurant with him. Later she would describe the progress to her intimates in her usual staccato utterances, like a goat hopping from crag to crag.
“My dear… So thrilling… He means wholesale murder… Told us so… And there was a man close by, watching him all the time… A Government spy probably… Do you think I shall be arrested? …If only he allows Bill and me to escape when it comes… The revolution, I mean… I think Monte is the place… But one never knows… Probably the croupiers will be armed with pistols, or something dreadful… Except that if it’s the labouring classes who are rising, we ought to shoot the croupiers… It is so difficult to know what to do.”
Vane turned to follow her, as she threaded her way between the tables, and at that moment he saw Joan. The grey eyes were fixed on him mockingly, and he felt as if everyone in the room must hear the sudden thumping of his heart. With a murmured apology to his hostess, he left her and crossed to Joan’s table.
“This is an unexpected surprise,” she remarked as he came up.
“Do you know Mr Baxter – Captain Vane…”
Vane looked curiously at the man who had invoked his late companion’s wrath. Then his glance fell on the bottle of Vichy in front of the millionaire, and his jaw tightened.
“You left Blandford very unexpectedly, Miss Devereux,” he said politely.
“Yes – I had to go North suddenly.” She looked at him with a smile. “You see – I was frightened…”
“Frightened…” murmured Vane.
“A friend of mine – a very great friend of mine – a girl, was in danger of making a fool of herself.” Her eyes were fixed on the band, and his heart began to thump again.
“I trust the catastrophe was averted,” he remarked.
“One never knows in these cases, does one?” she answered. He saw the trace of a smile hover on her lips; then she turned to her companion. “Captain Vane was one of the convalescents at Rumfold Hall,” she explained.
Mr Baxter grunted. “Going over again soon?” he asked in a grating voice.
“I’m on leave at present,” said Vane briefly.
“Well, if you’ll forgive my saying so,” continued Baxter in his harsh voice, “your luncheon companion today is a gentleman you want to be careful with…”
Vane raised his eyebrows. “You are more than kind,” he murmured. “But I think…”
Mr Baxter waved his hand. “I mean no offence,” he said. “But that man Ramage is one of the men who are going to ruin this country…”
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“Funnily enough, Mr Baxter, he seems to be of the opinion that you are one of the men who have already done so.”
The millionaire, in no wise offended, roared with laughter. Then he became serious again. “The old catchwords,” he grated. “Bloated capitalist – sweated labour, growing fat on the bodies and souls of those we employ… Rot, sir; twaddle, sir. There’s no business such as mine would last for one moment if I didn’t look after my workpeople. Pure selfishness on my part, I admit. If I had my way I’d sack the lot and install machines. But I can’t… And if I could, do you suppose I’d neglect my machine… Save a shilling for lubricating oil and do a hundred pounds’ worth of damage? Don’t you believe it, Captain Vane… But, I’ll be damned if I’ll be dictated to by the man I pay… I pay them a fair wage and they know it. And if I have any of this rot of sympathetic strikes after the war, I’ll shut everything down for good and let ’em starve…” He looked at Joan… “I wouldn’t be sorry to have a long rest,” he continued thoughtfully.
“Captain Vane is a seeker after truth,” she remarked. “It must be most valuable,” she turned to Vane, “to hear two such opinions as his and Mr Ramage’s so close together.” Her eyes were dancing merrily.
“Most valuable,” returned Vane. “And one is so struck with the pugilistic attitude adopted by both parties… It seems so extraordinarily helpful to the smooth running of the country afterwards.” He had no occasion to like Baxter from any point of view – but apart altogether from Joan, he felt that if there was any justification in his late luncheon companion’s views, men such as Baxter supplied it.