On Jefferson Street, an out of the way part of the town, was a bicycle-shop kept by an old German named Kumme. One of the comrades told Jimmie that he wanted a helper, and Jimmie went there and got a job at two dollars a day. That was poor pay at present prices, but Jimmie liked the place, because his boss was a near-Socialist, a pacifist—for all countries except Germany. He got round it by saying that every nation had a right to defend itself; and Germany was the nation which had been attacked in this war. A good part of the energies of the old man went into proving this to his customers; if there were any customers who did not like it, they could go elsewhere.
Those who came were largely Germans, and so Jimmie was kept fully supplied with arguments against the munitions industry, which they called a trade in murder, and in favour of the programme of “Feed America First”. Among those who frequented the place was Jerry Coleman, who was still on the job, and as well supplied with ten-dollar bills as ever. He had now revealed himself as an organizer for a new propaganda society, called “Labour's National Peace Council”. Inasmuch as Labour and Peace were the phrases upon which Jimmie lived, he saw no reason why he should not back this organization. Coleman assured Jimmie he hated the Kaiser, but that the German “people” must be defended. So Jimmie became, without having the least idea of it, one of the agencies whereby the Kaiser was subsidizing social discontent in America.
But Jimmie was more careful now in his agitations. He had brought such distress into his home by his jail sentence, that he had been forced to make promises to Lizzie. Her anxiety for her children could no longer be kept to herself; and this caused a certain amount of friction between them, and sent Jimmie out grumbling at his lot in life. What was the use of trying to educate a woman, who could see no farther than her own kitchen-stove? When you wanted to be a world-saviour, to walk tip-toe on the misty mountain-tops of heroism, she dragged you down and chained you to the commonplace, taking all the zest and fervour out of your soul! The memories of “seam-squirrels” and of thin coffee and ill-smelling and greasy soup had slipped somewhat into the background of Jimmie's mind, and he lived again the sublime hour when he had confronted the court and stood for the fundamental rights of an American citizen. He wanted to have that act of daring appreciated at its true value. Poor, blind, home-keeping Lizzie, who could not fulfil these deeper needs of her husband's soul!
Jimmie had been, so far in his married life, as well domesticated as could be expected of a proletarian propagandist. He had yearned to own a home of his own, and meantime had manifested his repressed wish by getting a big packing-box and some broken shingles, and building a model play-house for Jimmie Junior in the back yard. He had even found time on his tired and crowded Sundays to start a garden in midsummer, the season when the local was least active. But now, of course, the war had come to obsess his mind, driving him to terror for the future of humanity, tempting him to martyrdoms and domestic irritations.
II.
It was at this critical period in Jimmie's life that there appeared in Leesville a vivid young person by the name of Evelyn Baskerville. Evelyn was no tired kitchen slave—with her fluffy brown hair, her pert little dimples, her trim figure, her jaunty hat with a turkey feather stuck on one side of her head. Evelyn was a stenographer and proclaimed herself an advanced feminist; at her first visit she set the local upside down. It happened to be “social evening”, when all the men smoked, and this “free” young thing took a cigarette from her escort and puffed it all over the place. This, of course, would not have made a stir in great centres of culture such as London and Greenwich Village; but in Leesville it was the first time that the equality of women had been interpreted to mean that the women should adopt the vices of the men.
Then Evelyn had produced from her handbag some leaflets on Birth Control, and proposed that the local should undertake their distribution. This was a new subject in Leesville, and while the members supposed it was all right, they found it embarrassing to have the matter explained too fully in open meeting. Evelyn wanted a “birth strike”, as the surest means of ending the war; she wanted the Worker to take up this programme, and did not conceal her contempt for reactionaries in the movement who still wanted to pretend that babies were brought by storks. The delicate subject was finally “tabled”, and when the meeting adjourned and the members walked home, everyone was talking about Miss Baskerville—the men mostly talking with the men, and the women with the women.
Pretty soon it became evident that the vivid and dashing young person was setting her cap for Comrade Gerrity, the organizer. As Gerrity was an eligible young bachelor, that was all right. But then, a little later, it began to be suspected that she had designs upon Comrade Claudel, the Belgian jeweller. Doubtless she had a right to make her choice between them; but some of the women were of the opinion that she took too long to choose; and finally one or two malicious ones began to say that she had no intention of choosing—she wanted both.
And then fell a thunderbolt into Jimmie's life. It was just after his arrest when fame still clung to him; and after the meeting Comrade Baskerville came up and engaged him in conversation. How did it feel to be a jailbird? When he told her that it felt fine, she bade him not be too proud—she had served thirty days for picketing in a shirt-waist strike! As she looked at him, her pretty brown eyes sparkled with mischief, and her wicked little dimples lost no curtain-calls. Poor, humble Jimmie was stirred to his shoe-tips, for he had never before received the attentions of such a fascinating creature—unless perchance it had been to sell her a newspaper, or to beg the price of a sandwich in his tramp days. Here was one of the wonderful things about the Socialist movement, that it broke down the barriers of class, and gave you exciting glimpses of higher worlds of culture and charm!
Comrade Baskerville continued to flash her dimples and her wit at Jimmie, despite the fact that Comrade Gerrity and Comrade Claudel and several other moths were hovering about the candle-flame, and all the women in the local watching out of the corners of their eyes. Finally, to Jimmie's unutterable consternation, the vivid young goddess of Liberty inquired, “Wouldn't you like to walk home with me, Comrade Higgins?” He stammered, “Yes”; and they went out, the young goddess plying him with questions about conditions in the jail, and displaying most convincing erudition on the subject of the economic aspects of criminology—at the same time seeming entirely oblivious to the hoverings of the other moths, and the disgust of the unemancipated ladies of Local Leesville.