CHAPTER VIII
JIMMIE HIGGINS PUTS HIS FOOT IN IT
I
The world struggle continued with constantly increasing ferocity.
All summer long the Germans hammered at the French and British
lines; while the British hammered at the gates of Constantinople,
and the Italians at the gates of Trieste. The Germans sent their
giant airships to drop loads of bombs on London and their submarines
to sink passenger-steamers and hospital-ships. Each fresh outrage
against international law became the occasion of more letters of
protest from the United States, and of more controversies in the
newspapers, and in Congress, and in Kumme's bicycle-shop on
Jefferson Street, Leesville.
In this last place, to be sure, the discussions were rather
one-sided. Practically all who came there regarded the munitions
industry as an accursed thing, and made no secret of their glee at
the misfortunes which befell it; at shipyards which caught fire and
burned up, at railroad bridges and ships at sea destroyed by
mysterious explosions. Kumme, a wizened-up, grizzle-haired old
fellow with a stubby nose and a bullet-head, would fall to cursing
in a mingling of English and German when anyone so much as mentioned
the fleets of ships that went across the water, loaded with shells
to kill German soldiers; he would point a skinny finger at whoever
would listen to him, declaring that the Germans in this country were
not slaves, and would protect their Fatherland from the perfidious
British and their Wall Street hirelings. Kumme took a newspaper
printed in German, and a couple of weeklies published in English for
the promotion of the German cause; he would mark passages in these
papers and read them aloud--everything that the mind of man could
recall or invent that was discreditable to Britain, to France and
Italy, to Wall Street, and to the nation which allowed Wall Street
to bamboozle and exploit it. There were many Americans who had
"muck-raked" their own country in the interests of social reform,
and had praised the social system of Germany. These arguments the
German propagandists now found useful, and Jimmie would take them to
the Socialist local and pass them about. From the meeting of the
local he and Meissner would go to the saloon where they had
rendezvous with Jerry Coleman, who would distribute more ten-dollar
bills to be used in the printing of anti-war literature.
Old Kumme had a nephew by the name of Heinrich, who paid him a visit
now and then. He was a tall, fine-looking fellow, who spoke much
better English than his uncle, and wore better clothes. Finally he
came to stay, and Kumme announced that he was to help in the shop.
They didn't need any help that Jimmie could see, and certainly not
from a fellow like Heinrich, who couldn't tell a spoke from a
handle-bar; but it was none of Jimmie's business, so Heinrich put on
working clothes, and spent a couple of weeks sitting behind the
counter conversing in low tones with men who came to see him. After
a while he took to going out again, and finally announced that he
had secured a job in the Empire.
