Max looked alarmed, then hopeful. Grace was almost as much News as H. R.
himself.
Andrew Barrett turned to H. R., and said, reproachfully:
"Here we've made sandwiching what it is, and these infernal
tightwads--"
"That's the word, Barrett," cut in H. R. "Go to it, my son!"
"How do you mean?" asked Barrett.
"Advertise in all the papers, morning and evening."
Young Mr. Barrett stared at him, then he shook his head, tapped it with
his knuckles, and confessed: "Solid!"
"_Give me a pencil!_" said H. R. It sounded like "Fix bayonets!"
"Nothing," Mr. Onthemaker permitted himself to observe, judicially, "is
so conducive to front-page publicity as intelligent violence. This is
not a strike, but a cause. Look at the militants--"
"There is something in that," admitted A. Barrett.
"There is something," said H. R., gently, "in everything, even in Max's
cranium. But, this is not a matter of principle, but of making money."
"But if you first establish--"
"No," interrupted H. R. "If you make money, the principle establishes
itself. The situation does not call for a flash of inspiration, but for
common sense. Listen carefully: Nothing is so timid as Capital!"
He looked at them as if further talk were redundant, superfluous,
unnecessary, a waste of time, and an insult.
"Well?" said Barrett, forgetting himself and speaking impatiently.
"Utilize it. Treat it as you would a problem in mathematics. You start
with an axiom. Build on it. Capital is timid. Therefore, people who have
money never do anything original; that is to say, venturesome; that is
to say, courageous. All new enterprises are begun and carried through by
people who have no money of their own to lose. I, single-handed, could
defeat an army commanded by Alexander, Caesar, Napoleon, and U. S. Grant,
if I could put into the pockets of each of the enemy's private soldiers
six dollars in cash. No man likes to be killed with money in his
clothes. Money is fear! Fear is unreasoning. I am opposed to injecting
fear into the situation. No, sir; instead, we must capitalize another
human force. Have this printed. Big blank margin. All the papers."
He gave them what he had written: