THE FATE OF ICIODORUM. 213 



away in his strong-box, and which shone out 

 through his plate-glass windows and made itself 

 felt in every smirk of his self-satisfied face. An- 

 other speaker said that the thief of labor was the 

 worst of all thieves, and for them to despoil him 

 was but to seek restoration of stolen goods. And 

 the schoolmaster said that he who takes for his 

 own the value labor has given is worse than he 

 who robs upon the public highway, for he adds 

 hypocrisy to theft. 



Some of them counselled an immediate attack 

 upon the managers of the Confidence Society, but 

 the voice of master-workman Jacques was for some 

 compromise which would restore them to employ- 

 ment. There had been a considerable fund col- 

 lected by the Chevaliers of Industry in the way 

 of dues and assessments. This fund he had dis- 

 tributed among the unemployed laborers, freely at 

 first, but of late more sparingly. There were many 

 who hoped to live through the winter on this fund, 

 and these spoke in no pleasant terms of the master- 

 workman's stinginess. The fund was nearly gone, 

 and Jacques well knew that if work was not soon 

 resumed, the order of Chevaliers of Industry would 

 come to a sudden end. Organized labor without 

 cash or credit is very soon disorganized. 



A few heeded his words of counsel and followed 

 his lead to their homes. But the bolder spirits 

 stiffened their resolve with the red wines for which 

 the cafe of the Lion d'Or is so justly famous, and 

 started for the residence of the President of the 

 Confidence Society. They roused him from his 

 bed, killed one of the Jonas men whom they found 



