They Call Me Carpenter: A Tale of the Second ComingSinclair, Upton
General
They Call Me Carpenter: A Tale of the Second Coming
Sinclair, Upton
Hollywood (Los Angeles, Calif.) -- Fiction; Jesus Christ -- Fiction
Rough! Tough!
We're the stuff!
We want to fight and we can't get enough!
And after that:
Hail! Hail! The gang's all here!
We're going to get the Kaiser!
The crowd joined in, and the words of the prophet were completely
drowned out. A moment later I heard a gruff voice behind me. “Make
way here!” There came a policeman, shoving through. “What's all this
about?”
The fellow with the kerosene can spoke up: “Here's this damn
Arnychist prophet been incitin' the crowd and preachin' sedition!
You better take him along, officer, and put him somewhere he'll be
safe, because me and my buddies won't stand no more Bolsheviki
rantin'.”
It seemed ludicrous when I looked back upon it; though at the moment
I did not appreciate the funny side. Here was a group of men engaged
in raiding a book-store, beating up the proprietor and his clerks,
and burning a thousand dollars worth of books and magazines on the
public street; but the policeman did not see a bit of that, he had
no idea that any such thing was happening! All he saw was a prophet,
in a white nightgown dripping with kerosene, engaged in denouncing
war! He took him firmly by the arm, saying, “Come along now! I guess
we've heard enough o' this;” and he started to march Carpenter down
the street.
“Take me too!” cried Moneta, the Mexican, beside himself with
excitement; and the policeman grabbed him with the other hand, and
the three set out to march.
XLVIII
I no longer had any impulse to interfere. In truth I was glad to see
the policeman, considering that his worst might be better than the
mob's best. About half the crowd followed us, but the singing died
away, and that gave Comrade Abell his chance. He was walking
directly behind the policeman, and suddenly he raised his voice, and
all the rest of the way to the station-house he provided marching
tunes: first the Internationale, and then the Reg Flag, and then the
Marseillaise:
Ye sons of toil, awake to glory!
Hark, hark! What myriads bids you rise!
Your children, wives, and grand sires hoary--
Behold their tears and hear their cries!
When we came to the station house, the policeman gave Moneta a shove
and told him to get along; he had not done anything, and was denied
the honor of being arrested. The officer pushed Carpenter through
the door, and bade the rest of us keep out.
Said Abell: “I am an attorney.”
“The hell you are!” said the other. “I thought you were an opery
singer.”
“I'm a practicing attorney,” said Abell, “and I represent the man
you have arrested. I presume I have a right to enter.”
“And I am a prospective bondsman,” I stated, with sudden
inspiration. “So let me in also.”
We entered, and the policeman led his prisoner to the sergeant at
the desk. The latter asked the charge, and was told, “Disturbing the
peace and blocking traffic.”
“Now, sergeant,” said I, “this is preposterous. All this prisoner
did was to try to stop a mob from destroying property.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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