Masters of deceit : $b The story of Communism in America and how to fight itHoover, J. Edgar (John Edgar)
History
Masters of deceit : $b The story of Communism in America and how to fight it
Hoover, J. Edgar (John Edgar)
Communism -- United States
It was early in the morning. The taxi had been summoned to a number on
James Street. The driver looked. On the corner stood an attractive woman,
dressed in a polka-dotted blouse and navy blue skirt. From her shoulder
dangled a brown purse.
“Take me to Elm and Cherry Streets,” she said, jumping into the cab.
When the taxi arrived at the destination, the woman changed her mind.
“Take me to the Surplus Store,” she instructed. The driver complied, now
almost doubling back to where he had started. The woman, however, still
wasn’t satisfied. She asked to be taken to another location. There she
alighted.
A few minutes later she hailed another cab and went straight to her
destination, a railroad station on the east side of town, some fifteen
miles away, even though she was then only a short distance from a
terminal where she could have caught the same train.
This wasn’t the Case of the Woman Who Changed Her Mind, but the shift of
a Party underground leader to a new hide-out. Why the strange gyrations?
She was endeavoring to make certain she wasn’t being followed.
In a northern state a scene similar to the Girl in the Polka-dotted
Blouse was being enacted. A woman with black curly hair, dressed in a
smart gray herringbone suit and wearing a large-brimmed hat, boarded a
southbound train. She carefully surveyed the passengers, then took a
seat near the rear. She was carrying on her left arm a blue tweed suit
and a hook-weave black coat. In her right hand she held a brown suitcase
trimmed in light tan. It was a long ride, all afternoon and night. Upon
arrival she sped to an address in an older section of town. A knock, the
door opened, and she disappeared inside. The woman was a high-ranking
Party leader reporting for a new underground assignment.
These two women, neatly dressed and looking like ordinary travelers, were
but two of many hundreds involved in Party underground work from 1951
to 1955. Many were away from home for months, even years, living under
assumed names in obscure rooms; moving under cover of darkness from one
city to another; scurrying along streets late at night; eating irregular
meals. Life in the underground for most is hard work, drudgery; not
romance, adventure, and fun.
How are comrades chosen for underground work?
As we have seen, only the most trusted and dedicated of Party members are
chosen. A study of the case histories of twenty-five top Party leaders
active in the underground during 1951-55 disclosed that all had been
in the communist movement for over twenty years. Their average age was
somewhat over forty.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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