XLIV
I swallowed a hasty cup of coffee, and drove in a taxi to the Labor
Temple. Carpenter had said he would be there early in the morning,
to help with the relief work again. I went to the rooms of the
Restaurant Workers, and found that he had not yet arrived. I noticed
a group of half a dozen men standing near the door, and there seemed
something uncordial in the look they gave me. One of them came
toward me, the same who had sought my advice about permitting
Carpenter to speak at the mass meeting. "Good morning," he said; and
then: "I thought you told me this fellow Carpenter was not a red?"
"Well," said I, taken by surprise, "is he?"
"God Almighty!" said the other. "What do you call this?" And he held
up a copy of the "Times." "Going in and shouting in the middle of a
church service, and trying to knock down a clergyman!"
I could not help laughing in the man's face. "So even you labor men
believe what you read in the 'Times'! It happens I was present in
the church myself, and I assure you that Carpenter offered no
resistance, and neither did anyone else in his group. You remember,
I told you he was a man of peace, and that was all I told you."
"Well," said the other, somewhat more mildly, "even so, we can't
stand for this kind of thing. That's no way to accomplish anything.
A whole lot of our members are Catholics, and what will they make of
carryings-on like this? We're trying to persuade people that we're a
law-abiding organization, and that our officials are men of sense."
"I see," said I. "And what do you mean to do about it?"
"We have called a meeting of our executive committee this morning,
and are going to adopt a resolution, making clear to the public that
we knew nothing about this church raid, and that we don't stand for
such things. We would never have permitted this man Carpenter to
speak on our platform, if we had known about his ideas."
I had nothing to say, and I said it. The other was watching me
uneasily. "We hear the man proposes to come back to our relief
kitchen. Is that so?"
"I believe he does; and I suppose you would rather he didn't. Is
that it?" The other admitted that was it, and I laughed. "He has had
his thousand dollars worth of hospitality, I suppose."
"Well, we don't want to hurt his feelings," said the other. "Of
gourse our members are having a hard time, and we were glad to get
the money, but it would be better if our central organization were
to contribute the funds, rather than to have us pay such a price as
this newspaper publicity."
"Then let your committee vote the money, and return it to Mr. T-S,
and also to Mary Magna."
It took the man sometime to figure out a reply to this proposition.
"We have no objection to Mr. T-S coming here," he said, "or Miss
Magna either."
"That is," said I, "so long as they obey the law, and don't get in
bad with the Western City 'Times'!" After a moment I added, "You may
make your mind easy. I will go downstairs and wait for Mr.
Carpenter, and tell him he is not wanted."
And so I left the Labor Temple and walked up and down on the
sidewalk in front. It was really rather unreasonable of me to be
annoyed with this labor man for having voiced the same point of view
of "common sense" which I had been defending to Carpenter's group on
the previous evening. Also, I was obliged to admit to myself that if
I were a labor leader, trying to hold together a group of
half-educated men in the face of public sentiment such as existed in
this city, I might not have the same carefree, laughing attitude
towards life as a certain rich young man whose pockets were stuffed
with unearned increments.
To this mood of tolerance I had brought myself, when I saw a white
robe come round the corner, arm in arm with a frock coat of black
broadcloth. Also there came Everett, looking still more ghastly, his
nose and lip having become purple, and in places green. Also there
was Korwsky, and two other men; Moneta, a young Mexican cigarmaker
out of work, and a man named Hamby, who had turned up on the
previous evening, introducing himself as a pacifist who had been
arrested and beaten up during the war. Somehow he did not conform to
my idea of a pacifist, being a solid and rather stoutish fellow,
with nothing of the idealist about him. But Carpenter took him, as
he took everybody, without question or suspicion.
