Comrades Part 20

But an evil spirit had entered the Garden of Eden, and joy had fled.

Over every heart hovered a brood of solemn questions. What will be my lot? Will I be allowed to choose my work? Or will they tell me what to do? Will it be dirty and disagreeable, or pleasant and inspiring?

Norman sat in his chair of state as presiding officer, bending over a ma.s.s of papers which Barbara had spread before him. She leaned close, and a stray hair from one of her brown curls touched his forehead. He trembled and stared blankly at the papers, seeing only a beautiful face.

"You understand?" she asked. "I've placed under each department the number of workers needed."

"Yes, yes, I understand!" he repeated, looking at her, blankly.

"I don't believe you've heard a word I've spoken to you," she said, reproachfully.

He was about to answer when the music stopped. Norman lifted his head with a start, rose quickly and faced the crowd.

"Comrades," he began, "the time has come for us to make good our faith in one another. You have proven yourselves brave and faithful in our struggle with the infamies of the system of capitalism. We call now for the heroes and heroines of actual work. We are entering, under the most favourable auspices, on the most important experiment yet made in the social history of the world. We are going to prove that mankind is one vast brotherhood--that love, not greed, can rule this earth.

"In our temporary organization we wish to outline the forms on which we will later found the permanent State of Ventura. At present we will organize four departments--Production, Distribution, Domestic Service, and Education.

"I am going to ask each one of you, by secret ballot, to choose your permanent work."

A cheer shook the building.

Norman flushed with pleasure, and continued quickly:

"It shall be my constant aim as your general manager under our temporary organization to give you the widest personal liberty consistent with the success of our enterprise.

"Before preparing your ballots for choice of your work, I shall have to ask that each head of a family and each unmarried man and woman first pa.s.s by the platform and draw lots for the a.s.signment of your rooms in our Mission House. There have been some complaints already, I'm sorry to say, on this question. Some wish to live on the first floor, some on the top, but everybody wants to live on the south side of the house with the glorious views of the sea, and n.o.body wishes to live on the north side. There is but one way to determine such a question in our ideal state. Fate must decide.

"The numbers of each room and suite are in the basket. The bachelors will be a.s.signed to the right wing, the girls to the left wing, the married ones to the centre of the building.

"Please form in line on the left and march toward the right aisle past the platform."

"Mr. Chairman!" called Roland Adair, the Bard of Ramcat.

Norman rapped for silence, and those who had risen resumed their seats.

"I protest, Mr. Chairman," continued the poet, "against the cruelty of such a process. The weak and the aged should be given their choice first."

"We left them all behind us!" Norman cried, with a wave of his hand.

"There are no weak and aged in this crowd. We belong to the elect. We have found the secret of eternal youth."

Another cheer swept the crowd, the poet subsided with a sigh of contempt, and the people quickly filed past the platform and drew their lots for permanent rooms in the building. The larger suites had been subdivided, so that the entire pioneer colony of two thousand found accommodations under one roof.

When the crowd had resumed their seats, and the last cry of triumph over a successful draw and the last groan of disappointment over an unlucky lot had subsided, Norman rose and made the most momentous announcement the Brotherhood had yet heard:

"In the Department of Production we need hod-carriers, bricklayers, carpenters, architects, teamsters, and skilled mechanics for the foundry and machine-shops, saw-mill, and flour mills. On the farm and orchard we need ploughmen and harvesters for grain and hay, gardeners, stablemen, and ditchers.

"In our Department of Domestic Service we need cooks, seamstresses, washerwomen, scrubbers and cleaners, waiters, porters, bell-boys, telephone girls, steamfitters, plumbers, chimney-sweeps, and sewer cleaners.

"In the Department of Education we need artists and artisans, teachers, nurses, printers and binders, pressmen and compositors, one editor, scientists and lecturers, missionaries, actors, singers, and authors.

"Now you each of you know what you can do best. Choose the work in which you can render your comrades the highest service of which you are capable and best advance the cause of humanity. Write your name and your choice of work on the blanks which have been furnished you."

The orchestra played while the ballots were being cast and counted.

The chairman at length rose with the tabulated sheet in his hand and faced his audience.

"Comrades," he said, with a twinkle in his eye, "that old saying I'll have to repeat, 'If at first you don't succeed, try, try again!'

Beyond the shadow of a doubt we shall have to try this election again.

If I didn't know by the serious look on your faces that you mean it I'd say off-hand that you were trying to put up a joke on me."

He paused, and a painful silence followed.

"Give us the ballot!" growled the Bard.

Norman looked at the list he held, and in spite of himself, as he caught the gleam of mischief in Barbara's eye, burst into laughter and sat down.

Wolf ascended the platform, glanced over the list and whispered:

"It's a waste of time. Call for the election of an executive council with full powers."

"We'll try once more," Norman insisted, quickly rising.

"Comrades, I'm sorry to say there is no election. We must proceed to another ballot, and if the industries absolutely necessary to the existence of any society are not voted into operation, we must then choose an executive council with full power to act. I appeal to your sense of heroism and self-sacrifice----"

"Give us the ballot! Read it!" thundered the offended poet.

"Yes, read it!"

"Read it!"

The shouts came from all parts of the hall. The crowd was in dead earnest and couldn't see the joke.

Once more the young chairman raised the fateful record of human frailty before his eyes, paused, and then solemnly began:

"In the first place, comrades, more than six hundred ballots out of the two thousand cast are invalid. They have been cast for work not asked for. They must be thrown out at once.

"Three hundred and sixty five able-bodied men choose hunting as their occupation. I grant you that game is plentiful on the island, but we can't spare you, gentlemen!

"Two hundred and thirty-five men want to fis.h.!.+ The waters abound in fish, but we have a pound-net which supplies us with all we can eat.

"Thirty-two men and forty-six women wish to preach.

"We do not need at present hunters, fishermen, or preachers, and have not called for volunteers in these departments of labour.

"Three hundred and fifty-six women wish to go on the stage, and one hundred and ninety-five of them choose musical comedy and light opera. I think this includes most of our female population between the ages of fourteen and thirty-five!"

A murmur of excitement swept the feminine portion of the audience.

"Allow me to say," he went on, "that the most urgent need of the colony at this moment cannot be met by organizing a chorus, however beautiful and pleasing its performances would be. We need, and we must have, waitresses and milkmaids. The chorus can wait, the cows cannot.