Part 19

So Peter proceeded to collect more evidence against the “Clarion” staff, and against the I. W. Ws. Presently he read the good news that the government had arrested a couple of hundred of the I. W. W. leaders all over the country, and also the national leaders of the Socialists, and was going to try them all for conspiracy. Then came the trial of McCormick and Henderson and Gus and the rest; and Peter picked up his “Times” one morning, and read on the front page some news that caused him to gasp. Joe Angell, one of the leaders in the dynamite conspiracy, had turned state’s evidence! He had revealed to the District Attorney, not only the part which he himself had played in the plan to dynamite Nelse Ackerman’s home, but he had told everything that the others had done--just how the dynamite had been got and prepared, and the names of all the leading citizens of the community who were to share Nelse Ackerman’s fate! Peter read, on and on, breathless with wonder, and when he got thru with the story he rolled back on his bed and laughed out loud. By heck, that was the limit! Peter had framed a frame-up on Guffey’s man, and of course Guffey couldn’t send this man to prison; so he had had him turn state’s evidence, and was letting him go free, as his reward for telling on the others!

The court calendars were now crowded with “espionage” cases; pacifist clergymen who had tried to preach sermons, and labor leaders who had tried to call strikes; members of the Anti-conscription League and their pupils, the draft-dodgers and slackers; Anarchists and Communists and Quakers, I. W. Ws., and Socialists and “Russellites.” There were several trials going on all the time, and in almost every case Peter had a finger, Peter was called on to get this bit of evidence, or to investigate that juror, or to prepare some little job against a witness for the defense. Peter was wrapped up in the fate of each case, and each conviction was a personal triumph. As there was always a conviction, Peter began to swell up again with patriotic fervor, and the memory of Nell Doolin and Ted Crothers slipped far into the background. When “Mac” and his fellow dynamiters were sentenced to twenty years apiece, Peter felt that he had atoned for all his sins, and he ventured timidly to point out to McGivney that the cost of living was going up all the time, and that he had kept his promise not to wink at a woman for six months. McGivney said all right, they would raise him to thirty dollars a week.

Section 70

Of course Peter’s statement to McGivney had not been literally true. He had winked at a number of women, but the trouble was none had returned his wink. First he had made friendly advances toward Miriam Yankovich, who was buxom and not bad looking; but Miriam’s thoughts were evidently all with McCormick in jail; and then, after her experience with Bob Ogden, Miriam had to go to a hospital, and of course Peter didn’t want to fool with an invalid. He made himself agreeable to others of the Red girls, and they seemed to like him; they treated him as a good comrade, but somehow they did not seem to act up to McGivney’s theories of “free love.” So Peter made up his mind that he would find him a girl who was not a Red. It would give him a little relief now and then, a little fun. The Reds seldom had any fun--their idea of an adventure was to get off in a room by themselves and sing the International or the Red Flag in whispers, so the police couldn’t hear them.

It was Saturday afternoon, and Peter went to a clothing store kept by a Socialist, and bought himself a new hat and a new suit of clothes on credit. Then he went out on the street, and saw a neat little girl going into a picture-show, and followed her, and they struck up an acquaintance and had supper together. She was what Peter called a “swell dresser,” and it transpired that she worked in a manicure parlor. Her idea of fun corresponded to Peter’s, and Peter spent all the money he had that Saturday evening, and made up his mind that if he could get something new on the Reds in the course of the week, he would strike McGivney for forty dollars.

Next morning was Easter Sunday, and Peter met his manicurist by appointment, and they went for a stroll on Park Avenue, which was the aristocratic street of American City and the scene of the “Easter parade.” It was war time, and many of the houses had flags out, and many of the men were in uniform, and all of the sermons dealt with martial themes. Christ, it appeared, was risen again to make the world safe for democracy, and to establish self-determination for all people; and Peter and Miss Frisbie both had on their best clothes, and watched the crowds in the “Easter parade,” and Miss Frisbie studied the costumes and make-up of the ladies, and picked up scraps of their conversation and whispered them to Peter, and made Peter feel that he was back on Mount Olympus again.

They turned into one of the swell Park Avenue churches; the Church of the Divine Compassion it was called, and it was very “high,” with candles and incense--althogh you could hardly smell the incense on this occasion for the scent of the Easter lilies and the ladies. Peter and his friend were escorted to one of the leather covered pews, and they heard the Rev. de Willoughby Stotterbridge, a famous pulpit orator, deliver one of those patriotic sermons which were quoted in the “Times” almost every Monday morning. The Rev. de Willoughby Stotterbridge quoted some Old Testament text about exterminating the enemies of the Lord, and he sang the triumph of American arms, and the overwhelming superiority of American munitions. He denounced the Bolsheviks and all other traitors, and called for their instant suppression; he didn’t say that he had actually been among the crowd which had horse-whipped the I. W. Ws. and smashed the printing presses and typewriters of the Socialists, but he made it unmistakably clear that that was what he wanted, and Peter’s bosom swelled with happy pride. It was something to a man to know that he was serving his country and keeping the old flag waving; but it was still more to know that he was enlisted in the service of the Almighty, that Heaven and all its hosts were on his side, and that everything he had done had the sanction of the Almighty’s divinely ordained minister, speaking in the Almighty’s holy temple, in the midst of stained-glass windows and brightly burning candles and the ravishing odor of incense, and of Easter lilies and of mignonette and lavender in the handkerchiefs of delicately gowned and exquisite ladies from Mount Olympus. This, to be sure, was mixing mythologies, but Peter’s education had been neglected in his youth, and Peter could not be blamed for taking the great ones of the earth as they were, and believing what they taught him.

The white robed choir marched out, and the music of “Onward Christian Soldiers” faded away, and Peter and his lady went out from the Church of the Divine Compassion, and strolled on the avenue again, and when they had sufficiently filled their nostrils with the sweet odors of snobbery, they turned into the park, where there were places of seclusion for young couples interested in each other. But alas, the fates which dogged Peter in his love-making had prepared an especially cruel prank that morning. At the entrance to the park, whom should Peter meet but Comrade Schnitzelmann, a fat little butcher who belonged to the “Bolshevik local” of American City. Peter tried to look the other way and hurry by, but Comrade Schnitzelmann would not have it so. He came rushing up with one pudgy hand stretched out, and a beaming smile on his rosy Teutonic countenance. “Ach, Comrade Gudge!” cried he. “Wie geht’s mit you dis morning?”

“Very well, thank you,” said Peter, coldly, and tried to hurry on.

But Comrade Schnitzelmann held onto his hand. “So! You been seeing dot Easter barade!” said he. “Vot you tink, hey? If we could get all de wage slaves to come und see dot barade, we make dem all Bolsheviks pretty quick! Hey, Comrade Gudge?”

“Yes, I guess so,” said Peter, still more coldly.

“We show dem vot de money goes for--hey, Comrade Gudge!” And Comrade Schnitzelmann chuckled, and Peter said, quickly, “Well, good-bye,” and without introducing his lady-love took her by the arm and hurried away.

But alas, the damage had been done! They walked for a minute or two amid ominous silence. Then suddenly the manicurist stood still and confronted Peter. “Mr. Gudge,” she demanded, “what does that mean?”

And Peter of course could not answer. He did not dare to meet her flashing eyes, but stood digging the toe of his shoe into the path. “I want to know what it means,” persisted the girl. “Are you one of those Reds?”

And what could poor Peter say? How could he explain his acquaintance with that Teutonic face and that Teutonic accent?

The girl stamped her foot with impatient anger. “So you’re one of those Reds! You’re one of those pro-German traitors! You’re an imposter, a spy!”

Peter was helpless with embarrassment and dismay. “Miss Frisbie,” he began, “I can’t explain--”

“_Why_ can’t you explain? Why can’t any honest man explain?”

“But--but--I’m not what you think--it isn’t true! I--I--” It was on the tip of Peter’s tongue to say, “I’m a patriot! I’m a 100% American, protecting my country against these traitors!” But professional honor sealed his tongue, and the little manicurist stamped her foot again, and her eyes flashed with indignation.

“You dare to seek my acquaintance! You dare to take me to church! Why--if there was a policeman in sight, I’d report you, I’d send you to jail!” And actually she looked around for a policeman! But it is well known that there never is a policeman in sight when you look for one; so Miss Frisbie stamped her foot again and snorted in Peter’s face. “Goodbye, _Comrade_ Gudge!” The emphasis she put upon that word “comrade” would have frozen the fieriest Red soul; and she turned with a swish of her skirts and strode off, and Peter stood looking mournfully at her little French heels going crunch, crunch, crunch on the gravel path. When the heels were clean gone out of sight, Peter sought out the nearest bench and sat down and buried his face in his hands, a picture of woe. Was there ever in the world a man who had such persistent ill luck with women?

Section 71

These were days of world-agony, when people bought the newspapers several times every day, and when crowds gathered in front of bulletin boards, looking at the big maps with little flags, and speculating, were the Germans going to get to Paris, were they going to get to the Channel and put France out of the war? And then suddenly the Americans struck their first blow, and hurled the Germans back at Chateau-Thierry, and all America rose up with one shout of triumph!

You would think that was a poor time for pacifist agitation; but the members of the Anti-conscription League had so little discretion that they chose this precise moment to publish a pamphlet, describing the torturing of conscientious objectors in military prisons and training camps! Peter had been active in this organization from the beginning, and he had helped to write into the pamphlet a certain crucial phrase which McGivney had suggested. So now here were the pamphlets seized by the Federal government, and all the members of the Anti-conscription League under arrest, including Sadie Todd and little Ada Ruth and Donald Gordon! Peter was sorry about Sadie Todd, in spite of the fact that she had called him names. He couldn’t be very sorry about Ada Ruth, because she was obviously a fanatic, bent on getting herself into trouble. As for Donald Gordon, if he hadn’t learned his lesson from that whipping, he surely had nobody to blame but himself.

Peter was a member of this Anti-conscription League, so he pretended to be in hiding, and carried on a little comedy with Ada Ruth’s cousin, an Englishwoman, who hid him out in her place in the country. Peter had an uncomfortable quarter of an hour when Donald Gordon was released on bail, because the Quaker boy insisted that the crucial phrase which had got them all into trouble had been stricken out of the manuscript before he handed it to Peter Gudge to take to the printer. But Peter insisted that Donald was mistaken, and apparently he succeeded in satisfying the others, and after they were all out on bail, he made bold to come out of his hiding place and to attend one or two protest meetings in private homes.

Then began a new adventure, in some ways the most startling of all. It had to do with another girl, and the beginning was in the home of Ada Ruth, where a few of the most uncompromising of the pacifists gathered to discuss the question of raising money to pay for their legal defense. To this meeting came Miriam Yankovich, pale from an operation for cancer of the breast, but with a heart and mind as Red as ever. Miriam had brought along a friend to help her, because she wasn’t strong enough to walk; and it was this friend who started Peter on his new adventure.

Rosie Stern was her name, and she was a solid little Jewish working girl, with bold black eyes, and a mass of shining black hair, and flaming cheeks and a flashing smile. She was dressed as if she knew about her beauty, and really appreciated it; so Peter wasn’t surprised when Miriam, introducing her, remarked that Rosie wasn’t a Red and didn’t like the Reds, but had just come to help her, and to see what a pacifist meeting was like. Perhaps Peter might help to make a Red out of her! And Peter was very glad indeed, for he was never more bored with the whining of pacifists than now when our boys were hurling the Germans back from the Marne and writing their names upon history’s most imperishable pages.

Rosie was something new and unforeseen, and Peter went right after her, and presently he realized with delight that she was interested in him. Peter knew, of course, that he was superior to all this crowd, but he wasn’t used to having the fact recognized, and as usual when a woman smiled upon him, the pressure of his self-esteem rose beyond the safety point. Rosie was one of those people who take the world as it is and get some fun out of it, so while the pacifist meeting went on, Peter sat over in the corner and told her in whispers his funny adventures with Pericles Priam and in the Temple of Jimjambo. Rosie could hardly repress her laughter, and her black eyes flashed, and before the evening was over their hands had touched several times. Then Peter offered to escort her and Miriam, and needless to say they took Miriam home first. The tenement streets were deserted at this late hour, so they found a chance for swift embraces, and Peter went home with his feet hardly touching the ground.

Rosie worked in a paper-box factory, and next evening Peter took her out to dinner, and their eager flirtation went on. But Rosie showed a tendency to retreat, and when Peter pressed her, she told him the reason. She had no use for Reds; she was sick of the jargon of the Reds, she would never love a Red. Look at Miriam Yankovich--what a wreck she had made of her life! She had been a handsome girl, she might have got a rich husband, but now she had had to be cut to pieces! And look at Sadie Todd, slaving herself to death, and Ada Ruth with her poems that made you tired. Rosie jeered at them all, and riddled them with the arrows of her wit, and of course Peter in his heart agreed with everything she said; yet Peter had to pretend to disagree, and that made Rosie cross and spoiled their fun, and they almost quarreled.

Under these circumstances, naturally it was hard for Peter not to give some hint of his true feeling. After he had spent all of his money on Rosie and a lot of his time and hadn’t got anywhere, he decided to make some concession to her--he told her he would give up trying to make a Red out of her. Whereupon Rosie made a face at him. “Very kind indeed of you, Mr. Gudge! But how about my making a `White’ out of you?” And she went on to inform him that she wanted a fellow that could make money and take care of a girl. Peter answered that he was making money all right. Well, how was he making money, asked Rosie. Peter wouldn’t tell, but he was making it, and he would prove it by taking her to the theater every night.

So the little duel went on, evening after evening. Peter got more and more crazy about this black-eyed beauty, and she got more and more coquettish, and more and more impatient with his radical leanings. Rosie’s father had brought her as a baby from Kisheneff, but she was 100% American all the same, so she told him; those boys in khaki who were over there walloping the Huns were the boys for her, and she was waiting for one of them to come back. What was the matter with Peter that he wasn’t doing his part? Was he a draft-dodger? Rosie had never had anything to do with slackers, and wasn’t keen for the company of a man who couldn’t give an account of himself. Only that day she had been reading in the paper about the atrocities committed by the Huns. How could any man with red blood in his veins sympathize with these pacifists and traitors? And if Peter didn’t sympathize with them, why did he travel round with them and give them his moral support? When Peter made a feeble effort at repeating some of the pacifists’ arguments, Rosie just said, “Oh, fudge! You’ve got too much sense to talk that kind of stuff to me.” And Peter knew, of course, that he _had_ too much sense, and it was hard to keep from letting Rosie see it. He had just lost one girl because of his Red entanglements. Was it up to him to lose another?

For a couple of weeks they sparred and fought. Rosie would let Peter kiss her, and Peter’s head would be quite turned with desire. He decided that she was the most wonderful girl he had ever known; even Nell Doolin had nothing on her. But then once more she would pin Peter down on this business of his Redness, and would spurn him, and refuse to see him any more. At last Peter admitted to her that he had lost his sympathy with the Reds, she had converted him, and he despised them. So Rosie replied that she was delighted; they would go at once to see Miriam Yankovich, and Peter would tell her, and try to convert her also. Peter was then in a bad dilemma; he had to insist that Rosie should keep his conversion a secret. But Rosie became indignant, she set her lips and declared that a conversion that had to be kept secret was no conversion at all, it was simply a low sham, and Peter Gudge was a coward, and she was sick of him! So poor Peter went away, heartbroken and bewildered.

Section 72

There was only one way out of this plight for Peter, and that was for him to tell Rosie the truth. And why should he not do it? He was wild about her, and he knew that she was wild about him, and only one thing--his great secret--stood in the way of their perfect bliss. If he told her that great secret, he would be a hero of heroes in her eyes; he would be more wonderful even than the men who were driving back the Germans from the Marne and writing their names upon history’s most imperishable pages! So why should he not tell?

He was in her room one evening, and his arms were about her, and she had almost but not quite yielded. “Please, please, Peter,” she pleaded, “stop being one of those horrid Reds!” And Peter could stand it no longer. He told her that he really wasn’t a Red, but a secret agent employed by the very biggest business men of American City to keep track of the Reds and bring their activities to naught. And when he told this, Rosie stared at him in consternation. She refused to believe him; when he insisted, she laughed at him, and finally became angry. It was a silly yarn, and did he imagine he could string her along like that?

So Peter, irritated, set out to convince her. He told her about Guffey and the American City Land & Investment Company; he told her about McGivney, and how he met McGivney regularly at Room 427 of the American House. He told her about his thirty dollars a week, and how it was soon to be increased to forty, and he would spend it all on her. And perhaps she might pretend to be converted by him, and become a Red also, and if she could satisfy McGivney that she was straight, he would pay her too, and it would be a lot better than working ten and a half hours a day in Isaac & Goldstein’s paper box factory.

At last Peter succeeded in convincing the girl. She was subdued and frightened; she hadn’t been prepared for anything like that, she said, and would have to have a little time to think it over. Peter then became worried in turn. He hoped she wouldn’t mind, he said, and set to work to explain to her how important his work was, how it had the sanction of all the very best people in the city--not merely the great bankers and business men, but mayors and public officials and newspaper editors and college presidents, and great Park Avenue clergymen like the Rev. de Willoughby Stotterbridge of the Church of the Divine Compassion. And Rosie said that was all right, of course, but she was a little scared and would have to think it over. She brought the evening to an abrupt end, and Peter went home much disconcerted.

Perhaps an hour later there came a sharp tap on the door of his lodging-house room, and he went to the door, and found himself confronted by David Andrews, the lawyer, Donald Gordon, and John Durand, the labor giant, president of the Seamen’s Union. They never even said, “Howdy do,” but stalked into the room, and Durand shut the door behind him, and stood with his back to it, folded his arms and glared at Peter like the stone image of an Aztec chieftain. So before they said a word Peter knew what had happened. He knew that the jig was up for good this time; his career as savior of the nation was at an end. And again it was all on account of a woman--all because he hadn’t taken Guffey’s advice about winking!