Theft Part 12

{Sakari}

The less you sell, the harder are the times?

{Dowsett}

Just so.

{Sakari}

Then if the people are thrifty, and buy less, times will be harder?

{Dowsett}

(_Perplexed._) Er--it would seem so.

{Sakari}

Then it would seem that the present bad times are due to the fact that the people are thrifty, rather than not thrifty?

(_Dowsett is nonplussed, and Mrs. Dowsett throws up her hands in despair._)

{Mrs. Dowsett}

(_Turning to Knox._) Perhaps you can explain to us, Mr. Knox, the reason for this terrible condition of affairs.

(_Starkweather closes note-book on finger and listens._) (_Knox smiles, but does not speak._)

{Dolores Ortega}

Please do, Mr. Knox. I am so dreadfully anxious to know why living is so high now. Only this morning I understand meat went up again.

(_Knox hesitates and looks questioningly at Margaret._)

{Hubbard}

I am sure Mr. Knox can shed new light on this perplexing problem.

{Chalmers}

Surely you, the whirlwind of oratorical swords in the House, are not timid here--among friends.

{Knox} (_Sparring._) I had no idea that questions of such nature were topics of conversation at affairs like this.

{Starkweather}

(_Abruptly and imperatively._) What causes the high prices?

{Knox}

(_Equally abrupt and just as positive as the other was imperative._) _Theft_!

(_It is a sort of a bombsh.e.l.l he has exploded, but they receive it politely and smilingly, even though it has shaken them up._)

{Dolores Ortega}

What a romantic explanation. I suppose everybody who has anything has stolen it.

{Knox}

Not quite, but almost quite. Take motorcars, for example. This year five hundred million dollars has been spent for motor-cars.

It required men toiling in the mines and foundries, women sewing their eyes out in sweat-shops, shop girls slaving for four and five dollars a week, little children working in the factories and cotton-mills--all these it required to produce those five hundred millions spent this year in motor-cars. And all this has been stolen from those who did the work.

{Mrs. Starkweather}

I always knew those motor-cars were to blame for terrible things.

{Dolores Ortega}

But Mr. Knox, I have a motor-car.

{Knox}

Somebody's labor made that car. Was it yours?

{Dolores Ortega}

Mercy, no! I bought it---- and paid for it.

{Knox}

Then did you labor at producing something else, and exchange the fruits of that labor for the motor-car?

(_A pause._)

You do not answer. Then I am to understand that you have a motor-car which was made by somebody else's labor and for which you gave no labor of your own. This I call theft. You call it property. Yet it is theft.

{Starkweather}

(_Interrupting Dolores Ortega who was just about to speak._)

But surely you have intelligence to see the question in larger ways than stolen motor-cars. I am a man of affairs. I don't steal motor-cars.

{Knox}

(_Smiling._) Not concrete little motor-cars, no. You do things on a large scale.

{Starkweather}

Steal?