V
Yes, even Jimmie! He made up his mind that he would work as hard as
ever he could, and produce as many automobile-trucks as he could.
But alas, a man cannot be hounded and oppressed all his life, cannot
have hatred and rebellion ground into the deeps of his soul, and
then forget it over-night because of certain intellectual ideas,
certain new items that he reads in his paper. What happened to
Jimmie was that his mind was literally torn in half; he found
himself, every twenty-four hours of his life, of two absolutely
contradictory and diametrically opposite points of view. He would
vow destruction to the hated German armies; and then he would turn
about and vow destruction to the men at home who were managing the
job of destroying the German armies!
For these men were Jimmie's life-long enemies, and were no more able
to forget their prejudices over-night than was Jimmie. For example,
the lying capitalist paper which Jimmie had to read every morning!
When Jimmie had read a patriotic editorial in the Ironton Daily Sun,
it had become utterly impossible for him to help win the war that
day! Or the politicians, seeking to use the war-cry of democracy
abroad to crush all traces of democracy at home; to "get" the
radicals whom they hated and feared, and by means of taxes on
necessities and a bonded debt to put the costs of the war on to the
poor! Or the capitalists, making fervid speeches about patriotism,
but refusing to give up the whip-hand over their wage-slaves!
Jimmie Higgins was working in a factory, making automobile-trucks
for the armies in France; and the owners of the factory would not
let the men have a union, and so there was a strike. The bosses made
an agreement to take everybody back and permit a union, and then
proceeded treacherously to violate the agreement, getting rid of the
most active organizers on this or that transparent pretext. Jimmie
Higgins, trying to help with the skill of his hands to make the
world safe for democracy, was turned out of his job and left to
wander in the streets, because a big profit-seeking corporation did
not believe in democracy, and refused to permit its workers any
voice in determining the conditions of their labour! The Government
was trying to deal with emergencies such as this, to put an end to
the epidemic of strikes which was hindering the war-work everywhere;
but the government had not yet got its machinery going, and meantime
Jimmie's little feeble sprout of patriotism got a severe chill.
Jimmie got drunk and wasted a part of his money on a woman of the
street. Then, being ashamed of himself, and still plagued by the
memory of his dead wife and babies, he straightened up and resolved
to start life anew. He found himself thinking about Leesville; it
was the only place in the world where he had ever been really happy,
and now since Deror Rabin had gone East, it was the only place where
he had friends. How were the Meissners getting on? How was Comrade
Mrs. Gerrity, nee Baskerville? What was Local Leesville thinking
about Russia and about the war? Jimmie took a sudden resolve to go
and find out. He priced a ticket, and found that he had enough money
and to spare. He would take the journey--and take it in state, as a
citizen and a war-worker, not as a tramp in a box-car!
