Mr. Jenner. Inferior to ours?
Mrs. Paine. To ours, or whether he still thought that the Soviet system was a better one. His discussion of the censorship made me feel that he wanted his listeners to know that he was not blind to the defects of the Soviet system, but it did not convince me that he was in favor of the American system. I was left wondering which country he thought conducted itself better.
Mr. Jenner. Did you have an interest in the Oswalds at this moment wholly apart from your interest in the Russian language?
Mrs. Paine. No.
Mr. Jenner. Were you intellectually curious about them is all I meant.
Mrs. Paine. Oh, yes. Well, it is most unusual to take such a step as he took.
Mr. Jenner. Had you had some notice in advance of this meeting, Mrs. Paine, of the fact that Mr. Oswald was at least—there had been publications of his having been a defector?
Mrs. Paine. No; I wasn't aware of that.
Mr. Jenner. When did you first learn of that?
Mrs. Paine. Well, a name is always given to someone who goes to the Soviet Union and wants to have citizenship there, isn't it, so I could well have assumed that there had been such, but I really didn't learn about it until after the assassination, I guess. No; I take it back.