JIMMIE HIGGINS

BY

UPTON SINCLAIR

LONDON






CONTENTS





I. JIMMIE HIGGINS MEETS THE CANDIDATE

II. JIMMIE HIGGINS HEARS A SPEECH

III. JIMMIE HIGGINS DEBATES THE ISSUE

IV. JIMMIE HIGGINS STRIKES IT RICH

V. JIMMIE HIGGINS HELPS THE KAISER

VI. JIMMIE HIGGINS GOES TO JAIL

VII. JIMMIE HIGGINS DALLIES WITH CUPID

VIII. JIMMIE HIGGINS PUTS HIS FOOT IN IT

IX. JIMMIE HIGGINS RETURNS TO NATURE

X. JIMMIE HIGGINS MEETS THE OWNER

XI. JIMMIE HIGGINS FACES THE WAR

XII. JIMMIE HIGGINS MEETS A PATRIOT

XIII. JIMMIE HIGGINS DODGES TROUBLE

XIV. JIMMIE HIGGINS TAKES THE ROAD

XV. JIMMIE HIGGINS TURNS BOLSHEVIK

XVI. JIMMIE HIGGINS MEETS THE TEMPTER

XVII. JIMMIE HIGGINS WRESTLES WITH THE TEMPTER

XVIII. JIMMIE HIGGINS TAKES THE PLUNGE

XIX. JIMMIE HIGGINS PUTS ON KHAKI

XX. JIMMIE HIGGINS TAKES A SWIM

XXI. JIMMIE HIGGINS ENTERS SOCIETY

XXII. JIMMIE HIGGINS WORKS FOR HIS UNCLE

XXIII. JIMMIE HIGGINS MEETS THE HUN

XXIV. JIMMIE HIGGINS SEES THE OTHER SIDE

XXV. JIMMIE HIGGINS ENTERS INTO DANGER

XXVI. JIMMIE HIGGINS DISCOVERS HIS SOUL

XXVII. JIMMIE HIGGINS VOTES FOR DEMOCRACY






JIMMIE HIGGINS

CHAPTER I

JIMMIE HIGGINS MEETS THE CANDIDATE

I





"Jimmie," said Lizzie, "couldn't we go see the pictures?"

And Jimmie set down the saucer of hot coffee which he was in the act
of adjusting to his mouth, and stared at his wife. He did not say
anything; in three years and a half as a married man he had learned
that one does not always say everything that comes into one's mind.
But he meditated on the abysses that lie between the masculine and
feminine intellects. That it should be possible for anyone to wish
to see a movie idol leaping into second-story windows, or being
pulled from beneath flying express trains, on this day of destiny,
this greatest crisis in history!

"You know, Lizzie," he said, patiently, "I've got to help at the
Opera-house."

"But you've got all morning!"

"I know; but it'll take all day."

And Lizzie fell silent; for she too had learned much in three years
and a half of married life. She had learned that working men's wives
seldom get all they would like in this world; also that to have a
propagandist for a husband is not the worst fate that may befall.
After all, he might have been giving his time and money to drink, or
to other women; he might have been dying of a cough, like the man
next door. If one could not have a bit of pleasure on a Sunday
afternoon--well, one might sigh, but not too loud.

Jimmie began telling all the things that had to be done that Sunday
morning and afternoon. They seemed to Lizzie exactly like the things
that were done on other occasions before meetings. To be sure, this
was bigger--it was in the Opera-house, and all the stores had cards
in the windows, with a picture of the Candidate who was to be the
orator of the occasion. But it was hard for Lizzie to understand the
difference between this Candidate and other candidates--none of whom
ever got elected! Lizzie would truly rather have stayed at home, for
she did not understand English very well when it was shouted from a
platform, and with a lot of long words; but she knew that Jimmie was
trying to educate her, and being a woman, she was educated to this
extent--she knew the way to hold on to her man.

Jimmie had just discovered a new solution of the problem of getting
the babies to meetings; and Lizzie knew that he was tremendously
proud of this discovery. So long as there had been only one baby,
Jimmie had carried it. When there had come a second, Lizzie had
helped. But now there were three, the total weight of them something
over sixty pounds; and the street-car line was some distance away,
and also it hurt Jimmie in his class-consciousness to pay twenty
cents to a predatory corporation. They had tried the plan of paying
something to a neighbour to stay with the babies; but the first they
tried was a young girl who got tired and went away, leaving the
little ones to howl their heads off; and the second was a Polish
lady whom they found in a drunken stupor on their return.

But Jimmie was determined to go to meetings, and determined that
Lizzie should go along. It was one of the curses of the system, he
said, that it deprived working-class women of all chance for
self-improvement. So he had paid a visit to the "Industrial Store",
a junk-shop maintained by the Salvation Army, and for fifteen cents
he had obtained a marvellous broad baby-carriage for twins, all
finished in shiny black enamel. One side of it was busted, but
Jimmie had fixed that with some wire, and by careful packing had
shown that it was possible to stow the youngsters in it--Jimmie and
Pete side by side, and the new baby at the foot.

The one trouble was that Jimmie Junior couldn't keep his feet still.
He could never keep any part of him still, the little
jack-in-the-box. Here he was now, tearing about the kitchen,
pursuing the ever-receding tail of the newest addition to the
family, a half-starved cur who had followed Jimmie in from the
street, and had been fed into a semblance of reality. From this
treasure a bare, round tail hung out behind in tantalizing fashion;
Jimmie Junior, always imagining he could catch it, was toddling
round and round and round the kitchen-table, clutching out in front
of him, laughing so that after a while he sat down from sheer
exhaustion.

And Jimmie Senior watched enraptured. Say, but he was a buster! Did
you ever see a twenty-seven months' old kid that could get over the
ground like that? Or make a louder noise? This last because Jimmie
Junior had tried to take a short cut through the kitchen range and
failed. Lizzie swooped down, clasping him to her broad bosom, and
pouring out words of comfort in Bohemian. As Jimmie Senior did not
understand any of these words, he took advantage of the confusion to
get his coat and cap and hustle off to the Opera-house, full of
fresh determination. For, you see, whenever a Socialist looks at his
son, or even thinks of his son, he is hotter for his job of
propagandist. Let the world be changed soon, so that the little
fellows may be spared those sufferings and humiliations which have
fallen to the lot of their parents!




II



"Comrade Higgins, have you got a hammer?" It was Comrade Schneider
who spoke, and he did not take the trouble to come down from the
ladder, where he was holding up a streamer of bunting, but waited
comfortably for the hammer to be fetched to him. And scarcely had
the fetcher started to climb before there came the voice of a woman
from across the stage: "Comrade Higgins, has the Ypsel banner come?"
And from the rear part of the hall came the rotund voice of fat
Comrade Rapinsky: "Comrade Higgins, will you bring up an extra table
for the literature?" And from the second tier box Comrade Mary Allen
spoke: "While you're downstairs, Comrade Higgins, would you mind
telephoning and making sure the Reception Committee knows about the
change in the train-time?"

So it went; and Jimmie ran about the big hall with his face red and
perspiring; for this was midsummer, and no breeze came through the
windows of the Leesville Opera-house, and when you got high up on
the walls to tie the streamers of red bunting, you felt as if you
were being baked. But the streamers had to be tied, and likewise the
big red flag over the stage, and the banner of the Karl Marx Verein,
and the banner of the Ypsels, or Young People's Socialist League of
Leesville, and the banner of the Machinists' Union, Local 4717, and
of the Carpenters' Union, District 529, and of the Workers'
Co-operative Society. And because Comrade Higgins never questioned
anybody's right to give him orders, and always did everything with a
cheerful grin, people had got into the habit of regarding him as the
proper person for tedious and disagreeable tasks.

He had all the more on his hands at present, because the members of
this usually efficient local were half-distracted, like a nest of
ants that have been dug out with a shovel. The most faithful ones
showed a tendency to forget what they were doing, and to gather in
knots to talk about the news which had come over the cables and had
been published in that morning's paper. Jimmie Higgins would have
liked to hear what the rest had to say; but somebody had to keep at
work, for the local was in the hole nearly three hundred dollars for
to-night's affair, and it must succeed, even though half the
civilized world had gone suddenly insane. So Jimmie continued to
climb step-ladders and tie bunting.

When it came to lunch-time, and the members of the Decorations
Committee were going out, it suddenly occurred to one of them that
the drayman who was to bring the literature might arrive while there
was nobody to receive it. So Comrade Higgins was allowed to wait
during the lunch hour. There was a plausible excuse--he was on the
Literature Committee; indeed, he was on every committee where hard
work was involved--the committee to distribute leaflets announcing
the meeting, the committee to interview the labour unions and urge
them to sell tickets, the committee to take up a collection at the
meeting. He was not on those committees which involved honour and
edification, such as, for example, the committee to meet the
Candidate at the depot and escort him to the Opera-house. But then
it would never have occurred to Jimmie that he had any place on such
a committee; for he was just an ignorant fellow, a machinist,
undersized and undernourished, with bad teeth and roughened hands,
and no gifts or graces of any sort to recommend him; while on the
Reception Committee were a lawyer and a prosperous doctor and the
secretary of the Carpet-weavers' Union, all people who wore good
clothes and had education, and knew how to talk to a Candidate.

So Jimmie waited; and when the drayman came, he opened up the
packages of books and pamphlets and laid them out in neat piles on
the literature tables, and hung several of the more attractive ones
on the walls behind the tables; so, of course, Comrade Mabel Smith,
who was chairman of the Literature Committee, was greatly pleased
when she came back from lunch. And then came the members of the
German Liederkranz, to rehearse the programme they were to give; and
Comrade Higgins would have liked first rate to sit and listen, but
somebody discovered the need of glue, and he chased out to find a
drug-store that was open on Sunday.

Later on there was a lull, and Jimmie realized that he was hungry.
He examined the contents of his pockets and found that he had
seventeen cents. It was a long way to his home, so he would step
round the corner and have a cup of coffee and a couple of "sinkers"
at "Tom's". He first conscientiously asked if anybody needed
anything, and Comrade Mabel Smith told him to hurry back to help her
put out the leaflets on the seats, and Comrade Meissner would need
help in arranging the chairs on the stage.




III



When you went from the Leesville Opera-house and turned West in Main
Street, you passed Heinz's Cafe, which was a "swell" eating-place,
and not for Jimmie; and then the "Bijou Nickelodeon", with a
mechanical piano in the entrance; and the "Bon Marche Shoe Store",
which was always having a fire-sale or a removal sale or a
bankruptcy clearing-out; and then Lipsky's "Picture Palace", with a
brown and yellow cowboy galloping away with a red and yellow maiden
in his arms; then Harrod's "Fancy Grocery" on the corner. And in
each of these places there was a show-card in the window, with a
picture of the Candidate, and the announcement that on Sunday
evening, at eight o'clock, he would speak at the Leesville
Opera-house on "War, the Reason and the Remedy". Jimmie Higgins
looked at the cards, and a dignified yet joyful pride stirred in his
bosom; for all of them were there because he, Jimmie, had
interviewed the proprietors and obtained their more or less
reluctant consent.

Jimmie knew that on this Sunday, in cities all over Germany,
Austria, Belgium, France and England, the workers were gathering by
millions and tens of millions, to protest against the red horror of
war being let loose over their heads. And in America too--a call
would go from the new world to the old, that the workers should rise
and carry out their pledge to prevent this crime against mankind.
He, Jimmie Higgins, had no voice that anybody would heed; but he had
helped to bring the people of his city to hear a man who had a
voice, and who would show the meaning of this world-crisis to the
working-people.

It was the party's Candidate for President. At this time only
congressional elections were pending, but this man had been
Candidate for President so often that every one thought of him in
that role. You might say that each of his campaigns lasted four
years; he travelled from one end of the land to the other, and
counted by the millions those who heard his burning, bitter message.
It had chanced that the day which the War-lords and Money-lords of
Europe had chosen to drive their slaves to slaughter was the day on
which the Candidate had been scheduled to speak in the Leesville
Opera-house. No wonder the Socialists of the little inland city were
stirred!

Jimmie Higgins turned into "Tom's Buffeteria", and greeted the
proprietor, and seated himself on a stool in front of the counter,
and called for coffee, and helped himself to "sinkers"--which might
have been called "life-preservers", they were blown so full of air.
He filled his mouth, at the same time looking up to make sure that
Tom had not removed the card announcing the meeting; for Tom was a
Catholic, and one of the reasons that Jimmie went to his place was
to involve him and his patrons in arguments over exploitation,
unearned increment and surplus value.

But before a discussion could be started, it chanced that Jimmie
glanced about. In the back part of the room were four little tables,
covered with oil-cloth, where "short orders" were served; and at one
of those tables a man was seated. Jimmie took a glance at him, and
started so that he almost spilled his coffee. Impossible; and yet--
surely--who could mistake that face? The face of a medieval
churchman, lean, ascetic, but with a modern touch of kindliness, and
a bald dome on top like a moon rising over the prairie. Jimmie
started, then stared at the picture of the Candidate which crowned
the shelf of pies. He turned to the man again; and the man glanced
up, and his eyes met Jimmie's, with their expression of amazement
and awe. The whole story was there, not to be misread--especially by
a Candidate who travels about the country making speeches, and being
recognized every hour or so from his pictures which have preceded
him. A smile came to his face, and Jimmie set down the coffee-cup
from one trembling hand and the "sinker" from the other, and rose
from his stool.




IV



Jimmie would not have had the courage to advance, save for the other
man's smile--a smile that was weary, but candid and welcoming.
"Howdy do, Comrade?" said the man. He held out his hand, and the
moment of this clasp was the nearest to heaven that Jimmie Higgins
had ever known.

When he was able to find his voice, it was only to exclaim, "You
wasn't due till five-forty-two!"

As if the Candidate had not known that! He explained that he had
missed his sleep the night before, and had come on ahead so as to
snatch a bit during the day. "I see," said Jimmie; and then, "I
knowed you by your picture."

"Yes?" said the other, patiently.

And Jimmie groped round in his addled head for something really
worth while. "You'll want to see the Committee?"

"No," said the other, "I want to finish this first." And he took a
sip from a glass of milk, and a bite out of a sandwich, and chewed.

So utterly rattled was Jimmie he sat there like a num-skull, unable
to find a word, while the man finished his repast. When it was over,
Jimmie said again--he could do no better--"You want to see the
Committee?"

"No," was the reply, "I want to sit here--and perhaps talk to you,
Comrade--Comrade--?"

"Higgins," said Jimmie.

"Comrade Higgins--that is, if you have time."

"Oh, sure!" exclaimed Jimmie. "I got all the time there is. But the
Committee--"

"Never mind the Committee, Comrade. Do you know how many Committees
I have met on this trip?"

Jimmie did not know; nor did he have the courage to ask.

"Probably you never thought how it is to be a Candidate," continued
the other. "You go from place to place, and make the same speech
every night, and it seems as if you slept in the same hotel every
night, and almost as if you met the same Committee. But you have to
remember that your speech is new to each audience, and you have to
make it as if you had never made it before; also you have to
remember that the Committee is made up of devoted comrades who are
giving everything for the cause, so you don't tell them that they
are just like every other committee, or that you are tired to death,
or maybe have a headache--"

Jimmie sat, gazing in awe-stricken silence. Not being a man of
reading, he had never heard of "the head that wears a crown". This
was his first glimpse into the soul of greatness.

The Candidate went on: "And then, too, Comrade, there's the news
from Europe. I want a little time. I can't bring myself to face it!"

His voice had grown sombre, and to Jimmie, gazing at him, it seemed
that all the sorrows of the world were in his tired grey eyes.
"Perhaps I'd better go," said Jimmie.

"No no," replied the other, with quick self-recovery. He looked and
saw that Jimmie had forgotten his meal. "Bring your things over
here," he said; and the other fetched his cup and saucer and plate,
and gulped the rest of his "sinkers" under the Candidate's eyes.

"I oughtn't to talk," said the latter. "You see how hoarse I am. But
you talk. Tell me about the local, and how things are going here."

So Jimmie summoned his courage. It was the one thing he could really
talk about, the thing of which his mind and soul were full.
Leesville was a typical small manufacturing city, with a glass
bottle works, a brewery, a carpet-factory, and the big Empire
Machine Shops, at which Jimmie himself spent sixty-three hours of
his life each week. The workers were asleep, of course; but still
you couldn't complain, the movement was growing. The local boasted
of a hundred and twenty members, though of course, only about thirty
of them could be counted on for real work. That was the case
everywhere, the Candidate put in--it was always a few who made the
sacrifice and kept things alive.

Then Jimmie went on to tell about to-night's meeting, the
preparations they had made, the troubles they had had. The police
had suddenly decided to enforce the law against delivering circulars
from house to house; though they allowed Isaac's "Emporium" to use
this method of announcement. The Leesville Herald and Evening
Courier were enthusiastic for the police action; if you couldn't
give out circulars, obviously you would have to advertise in these
papers. The Candidate smiled--he knew about American police
officials, and also about American journalism.

Jimmie had been laid off for a couple of days at the shop, and he
told how he had put this time to good use, getting announcements of
the meeting into the stores. There was an old Scotchman in a real
estate office just across the way. "Git oot!" he said. "So I thought
I'd better git oot!" said Jimmie. And then, taking his life into his
hands, he had gone into the First National Bank. There was a
gentleman walking across the floor, and Jimmie went up to him and
held out one of the placards with the picture of the Candidate.
"Would you be so good as to put this in your window?" he inquired;
and the other looked at it coldly. Then he smiled--he was a good
sort, apparently. "I don't think my customers would patronize your
business," he said; but Jimmie went at him to take some tickets and
learn about Socialism--and would you believe it, he had actually
shelled out a dollar! "I found out afterwards that it was Ashton
Charmers, the president of the bank!" said Jimmie. "I'd a' been
scared, if I'd a' known."

He had not meant to talk about himself; he was just trying to
entertain a tired Candidate, to keep him from brooding over a world
going to war. But the Candidate, listening, found tears trying to
steal into his eyes. He watched the figure before him--a bowed,
undernourished little man, with one shoulder lower than the other, a
straggly brown moustache stained with coffee, and stumpy black
teeth, and gnarled hands into which the dirt and grease were ground
so deeply that washing them would obviously be a waste of time. His
clothes were worn and shapeless, his celluloid collar was cracked
and his necktie was almost a rag. You would never have looked at
such a man twice on the street--and yet the Candidate saw in him one
of those obscure heroes who are making a movement which is to
transform the world.




V



"Comrade Higgins," said the Candidate, after a bit, "let's you and
me run away."

Jimmie looked startled. "How?"

"I mean from the Committee, and from the meeting, and from
everything." And then, seeing the dismay in the other's face: "I
mean, let's take a walk in the country."

"Oh!" said Jimmie.

"I see it through the windows of the railroad-cars, but I don't set
foot on it for months at a time. And I was brought up in the
country. Were you?"

"I was brought up everywhere," said the little machinist.

They got up, and paid each their ten cents to the proprietor of the
"Buffeteria." Jimmie could not resist the temptation to introduce
his hero, and show a pious Catholic that a Socialist Candidate had
neither hoofs nor horns. The Candidate was used to being introduced
for that purpose and had certain spontaneous and cordial words which
he had said not less than ten thousand times before; with the result
that the pious Catholic gave his promise to come to the meeting that
night.

They went out; and because some member of the Committee might be
passing on Main Street, Jimmie took his hero by an alley into a back
street; and they walked past the glass-factory, which to the
outsider was a long board fence, and across the Atlantic Western
railroad tracks, and past the carpet-factory, a huge four-story box
made of bricks; after which the rows of wooden shacks began to thin
out, and there were vacant lots and ash-heaps, and at last the
beginning of farms.

The Candidate's legs were long, and Jimmie's, alas, were short, so
he had almost to run. The sun blazed down on them, and sweat,
starting from the Candidate's bald head stole under the band of his
straw hat and down to his wilting collar; so he took off his coat
and hung it over his arm, and went on, faster than ever. Jimmie
raced beside him, afraid to speak, for he divined that the Candidate
was brooding over the world-calamity, the millions of young men
marching out to slaughter. On the placards which Jimmie had been
distributing in Leesville, there were two lines about the Candidate,
written by America's favourite poet:

    As warm heart as ever beat
    Betwixt here and judgement seat.

So they went on for perhaps an hour, by which time they were really
in the country. They came to a bridge which crossed the river Lee,
and there the Candidate suddenly stopped, and stood looking at the
water sliding below him, and at the vista through which it wound, an
avenue of green trees with stretches of pasture and cattle grazing.
"That looks fine," he said. "Let's go down." So they climbed a
fence, and made their way along the river for a distance, until a
turn of the stream took them out of sight of the road.

There they sat on a shelving bank, and mopped the perspiration from
their foreheads and necks, and gazed into the rippling current. You
couldn't exactly say it was crystal clear, for when there is a town
every ten miles or so along a stream, with factories pouring various
kinds of chemicals into it, the job becomes too much for the
restoring forces of Mother Nature. But it would take a dirty stream
indeed not to look inviting in midsummer after a four-mile walk. So
presently the Candidate turned to Jimmie, with a mischievous look
upon his face. "Comrade Higgins, were you ever in a swimmin' hole?"

"Sure I was!" said Jimmie.

"Where?"

"Everywhere. I was on the road off an' on ten years--till I got
married."

"Well," said the Candidate, still smiling, "what do you say?"

"I say sure!" replied Jimmie.

He was almost beside himself with awe, at this unbelieveable strange
fortune, this real comradeship with the hero of his dreams. To
Jimmie this man had been a disembodied intelligence, a dispenser of
proletarian inspiration, a supernatural being who went about the
country standing upon platforms and swaying the souls of multitudes.
It had never occurred to Jimmie that he might have a bare body, and
might enjoy splashing about in cool water like a boy playing
"hookey" from school. The saying is that familiarity breeds
contempt, but for Jimmie it bred rapture.




VI



They walked home again, more slowly. The Candidate asked Jimmie
about his life, and Jimmie told the story of a Socialist--not one of
the leaders, the "intellectuals", but of the "rank and file".
Jimmie's father was a working man out of a job, who had left his
family before Jimmie had joined it; Jimmie's mother had died three
years later, so he did not remember her, nor could he recall a word
of the foreign language he had spoken at home, nor did he even know
what the language was. He had been taken in charge by the city, and
farmed out to a negro woman who had eight miserable starvelings
under her care, feeding them on gruel and water, and not even giving
them a blanket in winter. You might not think that possible--

"I know America," put in the Candidate.

Jimmie went on. At nine he had been boarded with a woodsaw man, who
worked him sixteen hours a day and beat him in addition; so Jimmie
had skipped out, and for ten years had lived the life of a street
waif in the cities and a hobo on the road. He had learned a bit
about machinery, helping in a garage, and then, in a rush-time, he
had got a job in the Empire Machine Shops. He had stayed in
Leesville, because he had got married; he had met his wife in a
brothel, and she had wanted to quit the life, and they had taken a
chance together.

"I don't tell that to everybody," said Jimmie. "You know--they
mightn't understand. But I don't mind you knowin'."

"Thank you," replied the Candidate, and put his hand on Jimmie's
shoulder. "Tell me how you became a Socialist."

There was nothing special about that, was the answer. There had been
a fellow in the shop who was always "chewing the rag"; Jimmie had
laughed at him--for his life had made him suspicious of everybody,
and if there was any sort of politician, it was just another scheme
of somebody to wear a white collar and live off the workers. But the
fellow had kept pegging away; and once Jimmie had been laid off for
a couple of months, and the family had near starved, and that had
given him time to think, and also the inclination. The fellow had
come along with some papers, and Jimmie had read them, and it dawned
upon him that here was a movement of his fellow-workers to put an
end to their torments.

"How long ago was that?" asked the Candidate, and Jimmie answered
three years. "And you haven't lost your enthusiasm?" This with an
intensity that surprised Jimmie. No, he answered, he was not that
kind. Whatever happened, he would keep pegging away at the task of
freeing labour. He would not see the New Day, perhaps, but his
children would see it; and a fellow would work like the devil to
save his children.

So they came to the city; and the Candidate pressed Jimmie's arm.
"Comrade," he said, "I want to tell you how much good this little
trip has done me. I owe you a debt of gratitude."

"Me?" exclaimed Jimmie.

"You have given me fresh hope and courage, and at a time when I felt
beaten. I got into town this morning, and I'd had no sleep, and I
tried to get some in the hotel and couldn't, because of the horror
that's happening. I wrote a dozen telegrams and sent them off, and
then I was afraid to go back to the hotel-room, because I knew I'd
only lie awake all afternoon. But now--I remember that our movement
is rooted in the hearts of the people!"

Jimmie was trembling. But all he could say was: "I wish I could do
it every Sunday."

"So do I," said the Candidate.




VII



They walked down Main Street, and some way ahead they saw a crowd
gathered, filling the pavement beyond the kerb. "What is that?"
asked the Candidate, and Jimmie answered that it was the office of
the Herald. There must be some news.

The other hastened his steps; and Jimmie, striding alongside, fell
silent again, knowing that the gigantic burden and woe of the world
was falling upon his hero's shoulders once more. They came to the
edge of the crowd, and saw a bulletin in front of the newspaper
office. But it was too far away for them to read. "What is it?" they
asked.

"It says the Germans are going to march into Belgium. And they've
shot a lot of Socialists in Germany."

"WHAT?" And the Candidate's hand clutched Jimmie's arm.

"That's what it says."

"My God!" exclaimed the man. And he began pushing his way into the
crowd, with Jimmie in his wake. They got to the bulletin, and stood
reading the typewritten words--a bare announcement that more than a
hundred leading German Socialists had been executed for efforts to
prevent mobilization. They continued staring, until people pushing
behind them caused them to draw back. Outside the throng they stood,
the Candidate gazing into space, and Jimmie gazing at the Candidate,
both of them dumb. It was a fact that they could not have been more
shocked if the news had referred to the members of Local Leesville
of the Socialist Party of America.

The pain in the Candidate's face was so evident that Jimmie groped
about in his head for something comforting to say. "At least they
done what they could," he whispered.

The other suddenly burst forth: "They are heroes! They have made the
name Socialist sacred for ever!" He rushed on, as if he were making
a speech-so strong becomes a life-time habit. "They have written
their names at the very top of humanity's roll of honour! It doesn't
make any difference what happens after this, Comrade--the movement
had vindicated itself! All the future will be changed because of
this event!"

He began to walk down the street, talking more to himself than to
Jimmie. He was borne away on the wings of his vision; and his
companion was so thrilled that he honestly did not know where he
was. Afterwards, when he looked back upon this scene, it remained
the most wonderful event of his life; he told the story, sooner or
later, to every Socialist he met.

Presently the Candidate stopped. "Comrade," he said, "I must go to
the hotel. I want to write some telegrams. You explain to the
Committee--I'd rather not see anyone till time for the meeting. I'll
find the way myself."






CHAPTER II

JIMMIE HIGGINS HEARS A SPEECH

I





In the Opera-house were gathered Comrade Mabel Smith and Comrade
Meissner and Comrade Goldstein, the secretary of the Ypsels, and the
three members of the Reception Committee--Comrade Norwood, the
rising young lawyer, Comrade Dr. Service, and Comrade Schultze of
the Carpet-weavers' Union. To them rushed the breathless Jimmie.
"Have you heard the news?"

"What is it?".

"A hundred Socialist leaders shot in Germany!"

"Herr Gott!" cried Comrade Schultze, in horror; and everyone turned
instinctively, for they knew how this came home to him--he had a
brother who was a Socialist editor in Leipzig, and who was liable
for the mobilization.

"Where did you see it?" cried Schultze; and Jimmie told what he
knew. And then the clamour broke forth! Others were called from the
back part of the hall, and came running, and there were questions
and cries of dismay. Here, too, it was as if the crime had been
committed against Local Leesville--so completely did they feel
themselves one with the victims. In a town where there was a
brewery, needless to say there were German workers a-plenty; but
even had this not been so, the feeling would have been the same, for
the Socialists of the world were one, the soul of the movement was
its internationalism. The Candidate discovering that Jimmie was a
Socialist had asked and received no further introduction, but had
been instantly his friend; and so it would have been with a comrade
from Germany, Japan, or the heart of Africa--he might not have
known another word of English, the word "Socialist" would have
sufficed.

It was a long time before they thought of any other matter; but
finally someone referred to the trouble which had fallen upon the
local--the Candidate had not showed up. And Jimmie exclaimed, "Why,
he's here!" And instantly all turned upon him. Where? When? How?

"He came this morning."

"And why didn't you let us know?" It was Comrade Dr. Service of the
Reception Committee who spoke, and with a decided sharpness in his
tone.

"He didn't want anybody to know," said Jimmie.

"Did he want us to go to the train and think he had failed us?"

Sure enough, it was after train-time! Jimmie had entirely forgotten
both the train and the committee, and now he had not the grace to
hide his offence. All he could do was to tell his story--how he had
spent the afternoon walking in the country with the Candidate, and
how they had gone swimming, and how they had got the news from the
bulletin board, and how the Candidate had acted and what he had
said. Poor Jimmie never doubted but that his own thrill was shared
by all the others; and at the next regular meeting of the local,
when Comrade Dr. Service sat down on some proposition which Jimmie
had ventured to make, the little machinist had not the faintest idea
what he had done to deserve the snub. He was lacking in worldly
sense, he did not understand that a prosperous physician, who comes
into the movement out of pure humanitarianism, contributing his
prestige and his wealth to the certain detriment of his social and
business interests, is entitled to a certain deference from the
Jimmie Higginses, and even from a Candidate.




II



You might have thought that Jimmie would be tired; but this was a
day on which the flesh had no claims. First he helped Comrade Mabel
in depositing upon every seat a leaflet containing a letter from the
local candidate for Congress; then he rushed away to catch a
street-car, and spent his last nickel to get to his home and keep
his engagement with Lizzie. He would not make with her the mistake
he had made with the Committee, you bet!

He found that Lizzie had faithfully carried out her part of the
bargain. The three babies were done up in bright-coloured calico
dresses; she had spent the morning in washing and ironing these
garments--also her own dress, which was half-red and half-green, and
of generous, almost crinoline proportions. Lizzie herself was built
on that scale, with broad hips and bosom, big brown eyes and heavy
dark hair. She was a fine strong woman when she had shed her
bedraggled house gown, and Jimmie was proud of his capability as a
chooser of wives. It was no small feat to find a good woman, and to
recognize her, where Jimmie had found Lizzie. She was five years
older than he, a Bohemian, having been brought to America when she
was a baby. Her former name--you could hardly call it her "maiden"
name, considering the circumstances--was Elizabeth Huszar, which
she pronounced so that for a long time Jimmie had understood it to
be Eleeza Betooser.

Jimmie snatched a bite of bread and drank a cup of metallic tasting
tea, and packed the family into the baby-carriage, and trudged the
mile and half to the centre of the city. When they arrived, Lizzie
took the biggest child, and Jimmie the other two, and so they
trudged into the Opera-house. On this hot night it was like holding
three stoves in your arms, and if the babies woke up and began to
cry, the parents would have the painful choice of missing something,
or else facing the disgusted looks of everyone about them. In
Belgium, at the "People's House", the Socialists maintained a
creche, but the American movement had not yet discovered that
useful institution.

Already the hall was half-full, and a stream of people pouring in.
Jimmie got himself and family seated, and then turned his eager eyes
proudly to survey the scene. The would-be-congressman's circulars
which he had placed in the seats were now being read by the sitters;
the banners he had so laboriously hung were resplendent on the
walls; there was a pitcher of ice water on the speaker's table, and
a bouquet of flowers and a gavel for the chairman; the seats in the
rear of the platform for the Liederkranz were neatly ranged, most of
them already occupied by solid German figures topped by rosy German
faces: to each detail of which achievements Jimmie had lent a hand.
He had a pride of possession in this great buzzing throng, and in
the debt they owed to him. They had no idea of it, of course; the
fools, they thought that a meeting like this just grew out of
nothing! They paid their ten cents--twenty-five cents for reserved
seats--and imagined that covered everything, with perhaps even a
rake-off for somebody! They would grumble, wondering why the
Socialists persisted in charging admission for their meetings--why
they could not let people in free as the Democrats and Republicans
did. They would go to Democratic and Republican meetings, and enjoy
the brass band and the fireworks, pyrotechnical and
oratorical--never dreaming it was all a snare paid for by their
exploiters!

Well, they would learn about it to-night! Jimmie thought of the
Candidate, and how he would impress this man and that. For Jimmie
knew scores who had got tickets, and he peered about after this one
and that, and gave them a happy nod from behind his barricade of
babies. Then, craning his neck to look behind him, suddenly Jimmie
gave a start. Coming down the aisle was Ashton Chalmers, president
of the First National Bank of Leesville; and with him-could it be
possible?--old man Granitch, owner of the huge Empire Machine Shops
where Jimmie worked! The little machinist found himself shaking with
excitement as these two tall forms strode past him down the aisle.
He gave Lizzie a nudge with his elbow and whispered into her ear;
and all around was a buzz of whispers--for, of course, everybody
knew these two mighty men, the heads of the "invisible government"
of Leesville. They had come to find out what their subjects were
thinking! Well, they would get it straight!




III



The big hall was full, and the aisles began to jam, and then the
police closed the doors--something which Jimmie took as part of the
universal capitalist conspiracy. The audience began to chafe; until
at last the chairman walked out upon the stage, followed by several
important persons who took front seats. The singers stood up, and
the leader waved his wand, and forth came the Marseillaise: a French
revolutionary hymn, sung in English by a German organization--there
was Internationalism for you! With full realization of the solemnity
of this world-crisis, they sang as if they hoped to be heard in
Europe.

And then rose the Chairman--Comrade Dr. Service. He was a fine, big
figure of a man, with grey moustache and beard trimmed to a point;
his swelling chest was covered by clean white linen and
tight-fitting broad-cloth, and he made a most imposing chairman,
reflecting credit on the movement. He cleared his throat, and told
them that they had come that evening to listen to one of America's
greatest orators, and that therefore he, the Chairman, would not
make a speech; after which he proceeded to make a speech. He told
them what a grave hour this was, and how the orator would tell them
its meaning, after which he proceeded to tell most of the things
which the orator would tell. This was a weakness of Comrade Dr.
Service--but one hesitated to point it out to him, because of his
black broad-cloth suit and his imposing appearance, and the money he
had put up to pay for the hall.

At last, however, he called on the Liederkranz again, and a quartet
sang a German song and then an encore. And then came Comrade
Gerrity, the hustling young insurance-agent who was organizer for
the local, and whose task it was to make a "collection speech." He
had humorous ways of extracting money--"Here I am again!" he began,
and everybody smiled, knowing his bag of tricks. While he was
telling his newest funny story, Jimmie was unloading the littlest
infant into Lizzie's spare arm, and laying the other on the seat
with its head against her knee, and getting himself out into the
aisle, hat in hand and ready for business; and as soon as the
organizer ceased and the Liederkranz resumed, Jimmie set to work
gathering the coin. His territory was the reserved-seat section up
in front, where sat the two mighty magnates. Jimmie's knees went
weak, but he did his duty, and was tickled to see each of the pair
drop a coin into the hat, to be used in overthrowing their power in
Leesville!




IV



The hats were taken to the box-office and emptied, and the
collection-takers and the Liederkranz singers resumed their seats.
An expectant hush fell--and then at last there strode out on the
stage the Candidate. What a storm broke out! Men cheered and clapped
and shouted. He took his seat modestly; but as the noise continued,
he was justified in assuming that it was meant for him, and he rose
and bowed; as it still continued, he bowed again, and then again. It
had been the expectation of Comrade Dr. Service to come forward and
say that, of course, it was not necessary for anyone to introduce
the speaker of the evening; but the audience, as if it had read the
worthy doctor's intention, kept on applauding, until the Candidate
himself advanced, and raised his hand, and began his speech.

He did not stop for any oratorical preliminaries. This, he said--and
his voice trembled with emotion--was the solemnest hour that men had
ever faced on earth. That day on the bulletin-board of their local
newspaper he had read tidings which had moved him as he had never
been moved in his life, which had almost deprived him of the power
to walk upon a stage and address an audience. Perhaps they had not
heard the news; he told it to them, and there sprang from the
audience a cry of indignation.

Yes, they might well protest, said the speaker; nowhere on all the
bloody pages of history could you find a crime more revolting than
this! The masters of Europe had gone mad in their lust for power;
they had called down the vengeance of mankind upon their crowned and
coronetted heads. Here to-night he would tell them--and the
speaker's hoarse and raucous voice mounted to a shout of rage--he
would tell them that in signing the death-warrant of those heroic
martyrs, they had sealed the doom of their own order, they had torn
out the foundation-stones from the structure of capitalist society!
The speaker's voice seemed to lift the audience from its seats, and
the last words of the sentence were drowned in a tumult of applause.

Silence fell again, and the man went on. He had peculiar mannerisms
on the platform. His lanky form was never still for an instant. He
hurried from one end of the stage to the other; he would crouch and
bend as if he were going to spring upon the audience, a long, skinny
finger would be shaken before their faces, or pointed as if to drive
his words into their hearts. His speech was a torrent of epigram,
sarcasm, invective. He was bitter; if you knew nothing about the man
or his cause, you would find this repellent and shocking. You had to
know what his life had been--an unceasing conflict with oppression;
he had got his Socialist education in jail, where he had been sent
for trying to organize the wage-slaves of a gigantic corporation.
His rage was the rage of a tender-hearted poet, a lover of children
and of Nature, driven mad by the sight of torment wantonly
inflicted. And if ever he had seemed to you an extremist, too angry
to be excused, here to-night he had his vindication, here to-night
you saw him as a prophet. For now the master-class had torn the mask
from its face, and revealed to the whole world what were its moral
standards! At last men saw their rulers face to face!

They have plunged mankind into a pit of lunacy. "They call it war,"
cried the speaker; "but I call it murder." And he went on to picture
to them what was happening in Europe at that hour--he brought the
awful nightmare before their eyes, he showed them homes blown to
pieces, cities given to the flames, the bodies of men pierced by
bullets or torn to fragments by shells. He pictured a bayonet
plunged into the abdomen of a man; he made you see the ghastly deed,
and feel its shuddering wickedness. Men and women and children sat
spellbound; and for once no man could say aloud or feel in his heart
that the pictures of a Socialist agitator were overdrawn--no, not
even Ashton Chalmers, president of the First National Bank of
Leesville, or old Abel Granitch, proprietor of the Empire Machine
Shops!




V



And what was the cause of this blackest of calamities? The speaker
went on to show that the determining motive was not racial jealousy,
but commercial greed. The fountain-head of the war was
world-capitalism, clamouring for markets, seeking to get rid of its
surplus products, to keep busy its hordes of wage-slaves at home. He
analysed the various factors; and now, with the shadow of the
European storm over their heads--now at last men and women would
listen, they would realize that the matter concerned them. He warned
them--let them not think that they were safe from the hoofs of this
war-monster, just because they were three thousand miles away!
Capitalism was a world phenomenon, and all the forces of parasitism
and exploitation which had swept Europe into this tragedy were
active here in America. The money-masters, the profit-seekers, would
leap to take advantage of the collapse over the seas; there would be
jealousies, disputes--let the audience understand, once for all,
that if world-capitalism did not make this a world-war, it would be
only because the workers of America took warning, and made their
preparations to frustrate the conspiracy.

This was what he had come for, this was the heart of his message.
Many of those who listened were refugees from the old world, having
fled its oppressions and enslavements. He pleaded with them now, as
a man whose heart was torn by more suffering than he could bear--let
there be one part of the fair garden of earth into which the demons
of destruction might not break their way! Let them take warning in
time, let them organize and establish their own machinery of
information and propaganda--so that when the crisis came, when the
money-masters of America sounded the war-drums, there might be--not
the destruction and desolation which these masters willed, but the
joy and freedom of the Co-operative Commonwealth!

"How many years we Socialists have warned you!" he cried. "But you
have doubted us, you have believed what your exploiters have told
you! And now, in this hour of crisis, you look at Europe and
discover who are the real friends of humanity, of civilization. What
voice comes over the seas, protesting against war? The Socialist
voice, and the Socialist voice alone! And to-night, once more, you
hear it in this hall! You men and women of America, and you exiles
from all corners of the world, make this pledge with me--make it
now, before it is too late, and stand by it when the hour of crisis
comes! Swear it by the blood of our martyred heroes, those
slaughtered German Socialists--swear that, come what will, and when
and how it will, that no power on earth or in hell beneath the earth
shall draw you into this fratricidal war! Make this resolution, send
this message to all the nations of the earth--that the men of all
nations and all races are your brothers, and that never will you
consent to shed their blood. If the money-masters and the exploiters
want war, let them have it, but let it be among themselves! Let them
take the bombs and shells they have made and go out against one
another! Let them blow their own class to pieces--but let them not
seek to lure the working-people into their quarrels!"

Again and again, in answer to such exhortations, the audience broke
out into shouts of applause. Men raised their hands in solemn
pledge; and the Socialists among them went home from the meeting
with a new gravity in their faces, a new consecration in their
hearts. They had made a vow, and they would keep it--yes, even
though it meant sharing the fate of their heroic German comrades!

--And then in the morning they opened their papers, looking eagerly
for more details about the fate of the heroic German comrades, and
they found none. Day after day, morning and afternoon, they looked
for more details, and found none. On the contrary, to their
unutterable bewilderment, they learned that the leaders of the
German Social-Democracy had voted for the war-budgets, and that the
rank and file of the movement were hammering out the goose-step on
the roads of Belgium and France! They could not bring themselves to
believe it; even yet they have not brought themselves to realize
that the story which thrilled them so on that fatal Sunday afternoon
was only a cunning lie sent out by the German war-lords, in the hope
of causing the Socialists of Belgium and France and England to
revolt, and so give the victory to Germany!






CHAPTER III

JIMMIE HIGGINS DEBATES THE ISSUE

I





The grey flood of frightfulness rolled over Belgium; and every
morning, and again in the afternoon, the front page of the Leesville
newspaper was like the explosion of a bomb. Twenty-five thousand
Germans killed in one assault on Liege; a quarter of a million
Russians massacred or drowned in the swamps of the Masurian Lakes;
so it went, until the minds of men reeled. They saw empires and
civilizations crumbling before their eyes, all those certainties
upon which their lives had been built vanishing as a mist at
sunrise.