Jimmie Higgins Part 39

"What's it doin' in Archangel?"

"Dunno that either."

"Holy Christ!" cried the plumber. "I bet them fellers are trying their stunts on us!"

"I hadn't thought of that," said Jimmie, subtly. "Maybe it's so."

"They won't get very far with the Yanks, I bet," predicted the other.

"No, I suppose not. But, anyhow, it's interesting, what they say."

"Lemme see it," said the plumber.

"But say," said Jimmie, "don't you tell n.o.body. I don't want to get into trouble."

"Mum's the word, old man." And the plumber took the dirty sc.r.a.p of paper and read. "By G.o.d!" said he. "That's kind o' funny."

"How do you mean?"

"Why, that don't sound like them fellers were backing the Kaiser, does it?" And the plumber scratched his head. "Say, that sounds all right to me!"

"Me too!" said Jimmie. "Didn't know they had that much sense."

"It's just what the German people ought to have, by G.o.d," said the plumber. "Seems to me we ought to hire fellows to give out things like that."

"I think so, too," said Jimmie, enraptured.

The plumber reflected again. "I suppose," said he, "the trouble is they wouldn't give it to the Germans only; they'd want to give it to both sides."

"Exactly!" said Jimmie, enraptured still more.

"And, of course, that wouldn't do," said the plumber; "that would interfere with discipline." So Jimmie's hopes were dashed.

But the upshot of the interview was that the plumber said he would like to keep the paper and show it to a couple of other fellows. He promised again that he wouldn't mention Jimmie, so Jimmie said all right, and went his way, feeling one seed was lodged in good soil.

II

The "Y" had come to Archangel along with the rest of the expedition, and had set up a hut, in which the men played checkers and read, and bought chocolate and cigarettes at prices which they considered too high. Jimmie strolled in, and there was a doughboy with whom he had had some chat on the transport. This doughboy had been a printer at home, and he had agreed with Jimmie that maybe a whole lot of politicians and newspaper editors didn't really understand President Wilson's radical thought, and so far as they did understand it, hated and feared it. This printer was reading one of the popular magazines, full of the intellectual pap which a syndicate of big bankers considered safe for the common people. He looked bored, so Jimmie strolled up and lured him away, and repeated his play-acting as with the plumber--and with the same result.

Then he strolled in to see one of the picture-shows which had been brought along to beguile the long Arctic nights for the expedition.

The picture showed a million-dollar-a-year girl doll-baby in her habitual role, a poor little child-waif dressed in the newest fashion and with a row of ringlets just out of a band-box, sharing those terrible fates which the poor take as an everyday affair, and being rewarded at the end by the love of a rich and n.o.ble and devoted youth who solves the social problem by setting her up in a palace. This also had met with the approval of a syndicate of bankers before it reached the common people; and in the very midst of it, while the child-waif with the ringlets was being shown in a "close-up" with large drops of water running down her cheeks, the doughboy in the seat next to Jimmie remarked, "Aw, h.e.l.l! Why do they keep on giving us this bunk?"

So Jimmie suggested that they "cut it", and they went out, and Jimmie played his little game a third time, and again was asked to leave the leaflet he had picked out of the gutter.

So on for two days until Jimmie had got rid of the last of the manifestoes which Kalenkin had entrusted to him. And on the evening of the last day, as the subtle propagandist was about to turn into his bunk for the night, there suddenly appeared a sergeant with a file of half a dozen men and announced, "Higgins, you are under arrest."

Jimmie stared at him. "What for?"

"Orders--that's all I know."

"Well, wait--" began Jimmie; but the other said there was no wait about it, and he took Jimmie by the arm, and one of the other men took him by the other arm, and marched him away. A third man slung Jimmie's kit-bag on to his shoulder, while the rest began to search the place, ripping open the mattress and looking for loose boards in the floor.

III

It didn't take Jimmie very long to figure out the situation. By that time he had come into the presence of Lieutenant Gannet, he had made up his mind what had happened, and what he would do about it.

The lieutenant sat at a table, erect and stiff, with a terrible frown behind his gla.s.ses. He had his sword on the table and also his automatic--as if he intended to execute Jimmie, and had only to decide which method to use.

"Higgins," he thundered, "where did you get that leaflet?"

"I found it in the gutter."

"You lie!" said the lieutenant.

"No, sir," said Jimmie.

"How many did you find."

Jimmie had imagined this emergency, and decided to play safe.

"Three, sir," said he; and added, "I think."

"You lie!" thundered the lieutenant again.

"No, sir," said Jimmie, meekly.

"Whom did you give them to?"

Jimmie hadn't thought of that question. It stumped him. "I--I'd rather not say," said he.

"I command you to say," said the lieutenant.

"I'm sorry, sir, but I couldn't."

"You'll have to say before you get through," said the other. "You might as well understand that now. You say you found three?"

"It might have been four," said Jimmie, playing still safer. "I didn't pay any particular attention to them."

"You sympathize with these doctrines," said the lieutenant. "Do you deny it?"