III
The young man in the car turned toward the crowd which was blocking
the way to the exit. "Get those men out of the way!" he yelled to
the guards. "Drive them along--God damn them, they've got no
business in here." And so on, with a string of dynamic profanity,
which stung both guards and policemen into action, and made them ply
their clubs upon the crowd.
"Do you know who that is?" asked Jimmie's companion on the box.
"That's Lacey Granitch."
Jimmie started, experiencing a thrill to the soles of his ragged
shoes. Lacey Granitch! In the four years that the little machinist
had worked for the Empire, he had never caught a glimpse of the
young lord of Leesville--something which may easily be believed,
for the young lord considered Leesville "a hole of a town", and
honoured it with his presence only once or twice a year. But his
spirit brooded over it; he was to Leesville a mythological figure,
either of wonder and awe, or of horror, according to the temperament
of the contemplator. One day "Wild Bill" had arisen in the local,
and held aloft a page from the "magazine supplement" of one of the
metropolitan "yellows". There was an account of how Lacey Granitch
had broken the hearts of seven chorus-girls by running away with an
eighth. He fairly "ate 'em alive", according to the account; in
order to give an idea of the atmosphere in which the young hero
abode, the whirl of delight which was his life, the artist of the
Sunday supplement had woven round the border of the page a maze of
feminine ankles and calves in a delirium of lingerie; while at the
top was a supper-table with champagne-corks popping, and a lady clad
in inadequate veils dancing amid the dishes.
This had happened while the local was in the midst of an acrimonious
controversy over "Section Six". Should the Socialist party bar from
its membership those who advocated sabotage, violence and crime?
Young Norwood was pleading for orderly methods of social
reconstruction; and here stood "Wild Bill", ripping to shreds the
reputation of the young plutocrat of the Empire Shops. "That's what
you geezers are sweating for! That's why you've got to be good, and
not throw monkey-wrenches in the machinery--so the seven
broken-hearted chorus-girls can drown their sorrows in champagne!"
And now here was the hero of all these romantic escapades, forsaking
the white lights of Broadway, and coming home to help the old man
keep his contracts. He stood in the seat of the automobile, glancing
this way and that, swiftly, like a hunter on the alert for dangerous
game. His dark eyes roamed here and there, his proud face was pale
with anger, his tall, perfectly groomed figure was eloquent of
mastership, of command. He was imperious as a young Caesar, terrible
in his vengeance; and poor Jimmie, watching him, was torn between
two contradictory emotions. He hated him--hated him with a deadly
and abiding hatred. But also he admired him, marvelled at him,
cringed before him. Lacey was a wanton, a cursing tyrant, a brutal
snob; but also he was the master, the conqueror, the proud, free,
rich young aristocrat, for whom all the rest of humanity existed.
And Jimmie Higgins was a poor little worm of a proletarian, with
nothing but his labour-power to sell, trying by sheer force of his
will to lift himself out of his slave-psychology!
There is an old adage that "a cat may look at a king". But this can
only have been meant to apply to house-cats, cats of the palace,
accustomed to the etiquette of courts; it cannot have been meant for
proletarian cats of the gutter, the Jimmie Higgins variety of red
revolutionary yowlers. Jimmie and his companion stood on their
perch, shouting "Ya! Ya!" and suddenly the crowd melted away in
front of them, exposing them to the angry finger of the young
master. "Get along now! Beat it! Quick!" And Jimmie, poor little
ragged, stunted Jimmie, with bad teeth and toil-deformed hands,
wilted before this blast of aristocratic wrath, and made haste to
hide himself in the throng. But it was with blazing soul that he
went; every instant he imagined himself turning back, defying the
angry finger, shouting down the imperious voice, even smashing it
back into the throat from which it came!
