He did not ask Medora to read the letters to Mr. Trenchard and Ned Dingle; but he had finished them and posted them by ten o’clock and then they set out.
He knew London and took Medora to the British Museum first. She had waited for him to speak about the previous night, while he, apparently, expected her to do so. She had changed her views as to his punishment and believed that she had quite forgiven him. But this was not the case and before the end of the day he found it out.
At the Museum he surprised her by the extent of his knowledge. She had heard enough by the time they went to lunch and better liked the Park, where they sat for a while in the afternoon. Medora saw wealth and beauty and power pass by while Kellock commented.
“That’s the sort of thing we’re out to alter,” he said. But she was not feeling in a socialistic mood.
“Why?” she asked. “Why shouldn’t there be beautiful horses and beautiful clothes in the world?”
“It isn’t the horses and clothes. It’s where they come from, Medora. The horses are bred for money, and the clothes are spun and made for money. But who makes the money? Do the people that ride the horses and wear the clothes make it? No—you and I make it. The workers make it. You and I have just as much right to ride in a carriage as the Queen of England.
“The wealth of the world is exploited,” he explained, “and the result is poverty and superfluity. The world could get on perfectly well without those horses and those clothes—yes, and those people; but it couldn’t get on without us. We’re carrying on the work of civilisation, not those dolls and puppets toying together. Poverty and wealth are the result of the same vicious factor in our social system. They are interdependent and spring from the same rotten roots. Banish poverty and you do away with hunger and ignorance and misery and immorality and other ills, all of which spring from it. And there’s only one way to banish poverty, and that’s to banish wealth. Then you get a self-respecting order of humanity instead of the present arrangement. If the nation’s rich, the people are rich. It all comes back to brain power, and the moment labour is strong enough in brain power, the rest follows. The Trade Unions are only a first little instalment. In fact they’re almost past their work now. We’ve gone beyond them. Syndicalism says good-bye to the poor and good-bye to the rich. Then we shall get face to face with reality.”