Comrade Yetta Part 12

She hesitated. She had expected him to rage and threaten her; his cringing manner disconcerted her. Anyhow it would give Mrs. Cohen time to breathe, so she reluctantly followed him into the dingy little office. He carefully closed the door.

"I've got sometin' to tell you. I. Vell--Yetta, you be a good girl und not make no trouble in the shop. Und ven de rush season is over, Yetta--I'll, yes, Yetta, I luf you. I'll marry you. You be a good girl und not make trouble, Yetta, und I'll marry you."

If he had threatened to kill her, Yetta would not have been so surprised. She was dumbfounded. And Jake, nervous, frightened, amorous Jake, took her amazed speechlessness for consent. He thought the magnificent generosity of his offer had overpowered her.

"Yes, Yetta," he drivelled on, "I luv you already since a long while. I vant to tell you, but the contract is zu close. I need you in the shop.

You're the best vorker. It's only a few veeks now, Yetta. Ve'll be rich.

Rich! I don't care if you ain't got no money. Ven I seed you first, Yetta, I luved you."

He grabbed one of her hands and tried to kiss her. The slap he received dizzied him.

"You come out in the shop, Jake Goldfogle," she cried, pulling open the door. "You tell them what you told me. What do you think the pig said to me?" she asked the surprised women. "You tell them, Jake Goldfogle, or I will. He wants me to marry him--after the rush season. He loves me so much he wants me to go on speeding for him--slave driving--till after the rush season. Oh, the pig! I'd rather be hustling on the street, Jake Goldfogle, than be married to a sweat-shop keeper."

Jake's temper was never very good; it had been torn by too many and desperate worries. To have his heart's dream thus publicly scoffed at, robbed him of his last shred of self-control. Giving tongue to an incoherent burst of rage and filth, he rushed at Yetta. She thought he was going to strike her. But she was too angry herself to be afraid.

"Don't you hit me, you brute," she screamed at him, shaking her own fists in his face. "I ain't working for you no more, Jake Goldfogle.

See? I ain't one of your slaves any more. I'm a free woman. I'll have you arrested, if you hit me. And shut your dirty mouth."

Jake was cowed. His fist unclenched.

"You see what kind of a boss we've been working for," Yetta said to the other women. "He ain't a man. He's a pig! Wanted me to marry him--after the rush season. I've quit him and you ought to quit too."

"Shut up," Jake shrieked.

"I won't shut up. See what you've done to Mrs. Cohen. You've killed her, and now you want to throw her out. We ought to strike."

"Don't you talk strike in my shop, you--"

"Yes. We ought to strike. You know the dirty deal we're getting. Rotten wages and speed. It's because we ain't got no union and don't fight. We ought to strike like the skirt-finishers."

"Police! Police!" Jake howled, rushing to the door. "I'll have you arrested, you dirty little--"

"I don't care if he does have me arrested," Yetta went on more quietly after he had gone. "If he was treating us decent, he wouldn't yell for the police, when somebody says 'strike.' I ain't afraid of jail. I'm afraid of staying here on the job and coughing myself to death. I'm going to quit, and you ought to too."

"You're a fool. You're making trouble," the bovine Mrs. Levy said with conviction.

"No. She ain't," Mrs. Weinstein spoke up. "I guess my man belongs to a union. He's told me lots of times that us working people ain't got no other hope. It's the bosses what make trouble by cheating us. I'll strike, if the rest do."

"I'll strike anyhow," Yetta said. "I won't never work for a pig like that, asking me to marry him after the rush season."

"I'll strike vid you, Yetta," the girl said who had been to the ball.

"My sister's a skirt-finisher. But the strike ain't no good unless everybody quits."

"I'll strike," another voice chimed in.

"All right," Mrs. Weinstein said. "We'll all strike."

"It's foolishness," Mrs. Levy protested, rubbing her trachoma-eaten eyes.

But the excitement had caught the rest of the women. And when Jake returned, hatless and breathless, with a phlegmatic Irish policeman, he met all his women coming downstairs. In spite of his frenzied pleading, the policeman refused to arrest them, refused even to arrest Yetta.

"I'll take your number. I'll report you, if you don't arrest her. She's been making trouble."

"Aw! Go on, ye dirty little Jew. I'll smack your face, if ye talk back to me. And you women, move on. Don't stand around here making a noise or I'll run you in."

But on the next corner the group of women did stop. Where should they go? What should they do next?

"n.o.body'll go back to work," Yetta said, "unless he'll take Mrs. Cohen, too, when she gets rested."

"I won't never get rested," the coughing woman said.

"Oh, yes, you will, sure," Mrs. Weinstein said. But everybody knew she was lying.

The girl whose sister was a skirt-finisher and who knew all about strikes took down the names and addresses of the twelve women. Mrs.

Weinstein promised to look after Mrs. Cohen. And Yetta started uptown to the office of the Woman's Trade Union League. And all the long walk her heart was chanting a glad hosanna. She wasn't a speeder any more. She could look free people in the face.

CHAPTER X

THE W. T. U. L.

It was near five in the afternoon when Yetta reached the brown-stone front which held the offices of the Woman's Trade Union League. It had once been a comfortable residence. But Business, ever crowding northward on Manhattan Island, had driven homes away. The house seemed dwarfed between two modern buildings of twelve and eighteen stories.

In what had formerly been the "parlor," Yetta found a rather barren, very businesslike office. Two stenographers were industriously hammering their typewriters, but the chair behind the big roll-top desk was empty.

"h.e.l.lo," one of the girls greeted her, hardly looking up from her notes.

"What do you want?" "I want to see Miss Train."

"Sit down. You'll have to wait. Advisory Council."

She jerked her head to one side to indicate the double doors which in more aristocratic days had led to the dining-room. It was anything but a cordial welcome. To be sure the two girls were "organized." Miss Train had persuaded them to form a union. One was president and the other was secretary, and there were about six other members. They had done it to please her, just as they would have done anything to please her.

Nevertheless they felt themselves on a very much higher social plane than mere shop girls.

Yetta sat down disconsolate. She had not expected to have to wait. She did not appreciate the overwhelming importance of an Advisory Council.

In fact, she did not know what it was. And she did not think that there could be anything more important than the strike in her shop. In a few minutes her impatience overcame her timidity.

"Say," she said, getting up and coming over to the girl who had spoken to her. "You tell Miss Train that I'm here. It's important--about a strike."

"Humph," the stenographer snorted, "skirt-finisher?"

"No. I ain't a skirt-finisher. I work bei vests. It's a new strike. Miss Train'll want to know about it right away."

"What do you think?" the stenographer asked her companion. "Can't disturb the Advisory Council, can I?"

The two girls cross-questioned Yetta severely, but at last gave in to her insistence. One of them knocked at the double doors. They were opened from the inside a couple of inches and Mabel looked out.