CHAPTER XVI
JIMMIE HIGGINS MEETS THE TEMPTER
I
When Jimmie Higgins stepped off the train at Leesville, it was a
blustery morning in early March, with snow still on the ground and
flurries of it in the air. In front of the station was a public
square, with a number of people gathered, and Jimmie strolled over
to see what was going on. What he saw was a score of young men, some
in khaki uniforms, some in ordinary trousers and sweaters, being
drilled. Jimmie, being in the mood of a gentleman of leisure,
stopped to watch the show.
It was the thing he had been talking and thinking about for nearly
three years: this monstrous perversion of the human soul called
Militarism, this force which seized hold of men and made them into
automatons, moving machines which obeyed orders in a mass, and went
out and did deeds of which none of them taken separately would have
been capable, even in their dreams. Here was a bunch of average nice
Leesville boys, employees of the shops near-by, "soda-jerkers" and
"counter-jumpers", clerks who had deftly fitted shoes on to the feet
of pretty ladies. Now they were submitting themselves to this
deforming discipline, undergoing this devilish transmogrification.
Jimmie's eye ran down the line: there was a street-car conductor he
knew, there was a machinist from the Empire, also there was a son of
Ashton Chalmers, president of the First National Bank of Leesville.
And suddenly Jimmie gave a start. Impossible! It could not be!
But--it was! Young Emil Forster! Emil a Socialist, Emil a German,
Emil a student and thinker, who had penetrated the hypocritical
disguises of this capitalist war, and had fearlessly proclaimed the
truth every Friday night at the local--here he was with a suit of
khaki on his rather frail figure, a rifle in his hand and a look of
grim resolve on his face, going through the evolutions of
squad-drill: left, right, left, right, left, right--column left,
march--one, two, three, four--left, right, left, right--squad right
about, march--left, right, left, right--squad left oblique
march--and so on. If you are to form any picture of the scene you
must imagine the swift tramp of many feet in unison--thump, thump,
thump, thump, thump, thump; you must imagine the marchers, with
their solemnly set faces, and the orders thundered out by a
red-faced young man of desperate aspect, the word MARCH coming each
time with a punch that hit you over the heart. This red-faced young
man was the very incarnation of the military despot as Jimmie had
pictured him; watching with hawk-like eye, scolding, pounding,
driving, with no slightest regard for the feelings of the slaves he
commanded, or for any of the decencies of civilized intercourse.
"Hold those half-steps, Casey! Keep your eye on the end man--you'll
have him splitting his legs if you don't wait for him. Column left,
march--one, two, three, four--now you're all right--off with
you--that's better! Put a little pep into your feet, Chalmers, for
God's sake--if you go marching into Berlin like that they'll think
it's the hospital squad! By the right flank, column fours, march--
watch your distance there, end man! How many times do you want me to
tell you that?"--and so on and on--tramp, tramp, tramp,
tramp--while a small boy standing beside Jimmie, evidently a truant
from school, chanted over and over: "Left--left--the soldier got
drunk and he packed up his trunk and he left--left! And do you not
think he was right--right?"
