m withdraw those demands to-day:
if they do, take it straight from me, gentlemen, we shall back them
again at once. Now, I want to see something fixed upon before I go
back to-night. Can't we have done with this old-fashioned tug-of-war
business? What good's it doing you? Why don't you recognise once
for all that these people are men like yourselves, and want what's
good for them just as you want what's good for you [Bitterly.] Your
motor-cars, and champagne, and eight-course dinners.

ANTHONY. If the men will come in, we'll do something for them.

HARNESS. [Ironically.] Is that your opinion too, sir--and yours--
and yours? [The Directors do not answer.] Well, all I can say is:
It's a kind of high and mighty aristocratic tone I thought we'd grown
out of--seems I was mistaken.

ANTHONY. It's the tone the men use. Remains to be seen which can
hold out longest--they without us, or we without them.

HARNESS. As business men, I wonder you're not ashamed of this waste
of force, gentlemen. You know what it'll all end in.

ANTHONY. What?

HARNESS. Compromise--it always does.

SCANTLEBURY. Can't you persuade the men that their interests are the
same as ours?

HARNESS. [Turning, ironically.] I could persuade them of that, sir,
if they were.

WILDER. Come, Harness, you're a clever man, you don't believe all
the Socialistic claptrap that's talked nowadays. There 's no real
difference between their interests and ours.

HARNESS. There's just one very simple question I'd like to put to
you. Will you pay your men one penny more than they force you to pay
them?

[WILDER is silent.]

WANKLIN. [Chiming in.] I humbly thought that not to pay more than
was necessary was the A B C of commerce.

HARNESS. [With irony.] Yes, that seems to be the A B C of commerce,
sir; and the A B C of commerce is between your interests and the
men's.

SCANTLEBURY. [Whispering.] We ought to arrange something.

HARNESS. [Drily.] Am I to understand then, gentlemen, that your
Board is going to make no concessions?

[WANKLIN and WILDER bend forward as if to speak, but stop.]

ANTHONY. [Nodding.] None.

[WANKLIN and WILDER again bend forward, and SCANTLEBURY gives an
unexpected grunt.]

HARNESS. You were about to say something, I believe?

[But SCANTLEBURY says nothing.]

EDGAR. [Looking up suddenly.] We're sorry for the state of the men.

HARNESS. [Icily.] The men have no use