Chapter 24
100% The Story of a Patriot by Upton Sinclair, Sections 84 to 86. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Section 84. All over the country the Red Trains were moving eastward, loaded with Wobblies and Communists, Pacifists and Anarchists, and a hundred other varieties of Bolsheviks.
They got a shipload together and started them off for Russia. The Red Arc, it was called, and the Red Soapboxers set tip a terrific uproar, and one Red clergyman compared the Red Arc to the Mayflower. Also there was some Red official in Washington who made a fuss and cancelled a whole block of deportation orders, including some of Peter's own cases.
This naturally was exasperating to Peter and his wife, and on top of it came another incident that was still more humiliating. There was a pink mass meeting held in American City to protest against the deportations. Guffey said they would quite probably raid the meeting and Peter must go along so as to point out the Reds to the Bulls.
The work was in charge of a police detective by the name of Garrity, head of what was called the Bomb Squad, but this man didn't know very much, so he had the habit of coming to Peter for advice. Now he had the whole responsibility of this meeting, and he asked Peter to come up on the platform with him, and Peter went.
Here was a vast audience, all the Red Fury which had been pent up for many months, breaking loose in a whirlwind of excitement. Here were orators, well dressed and apparently respectable men, not in any way to be distinguished from the born rulers of the country, coming forward on the platform and uttering the most reasonable sentences, denouncing the government, denouncing the blockade against Russia, praising
the Bolshevik government of Russia, declaring that the people who went away in the Soviet arc were fortunate because they were escaping from a land of tyranny into a land of freedom. At every few sentences the orator would be stopped by a storm of applause that broke from the audience. And what was a poor Irish Catholic police detective to make of a proposition like that?
Here stood an orator declaring, And Garity turned to Peter. What do you think of that? He said, his good-natured Irish face, blank with dismay. Peter thought it was the limit.
Peter knew that thousands of men all over America had been sent to prison for saying things less dangerous than that. Peter had read many sets of instructions from the Office of the Attorney General of the United States and knew officially that that was precisely the thing you were never, under any circumstances, permitted to say or to write or even to think.
So Peter said to Garity, That fellow's gone far enough. You better arrest him. Garity spoke to his men and they sprang forward on the platform and stopped the orator and placed him and all his fellow orators under arrest and ordered the audience out of the
building. There were a couple of hundred policemen and detectives on hand to carry out Garity's commands and they formed a line with their clubs and drove the crowd before them and carted the speakers off in a patrol wagon. Then Peter went back to Guffy's office and told what he had done and got a reception
that reminded him of the time Guffy had confronted him with the letter from Nell Doolan. Who do you think that was, you pinched? cried Guffy. He's the brother of a United States Senator. And what do you think he was saying?
That was a sentence from the Declaration of Independence. Peter couldn't get it. Peter was utterly lost. Could a man go ahead and break the law just because he happened to be the brother of a United States Senator?
And what difference did it make whether a thing was in the Declaration of Independence if it was seditious, if it wasn't allowed to be said? This incident brought Guffy and the police authorities of the city so much ridicule that Guffy got all his men together and read them a lecture explaining to them just what were the limits of the anti-red activities, just who it was they mustn't arrest, and just
what it was they couldn't keep people from saying. For example, a man couldn't be arrested for quoting the Bible. But Jesus Christ, Guffy, broke in one of the men. Have all of us got to know the Bible by heart? There was a laugh all around.
No, Guffy admitted, but at least be careful and don't arrest anybody for saying anything that sounds as if it came from the Bible. But hell, put in another of the men, who happened to be an ex-preacher. That'll tie us up tighter than a jail sentence. Look what's in the Bible.
And he proceeded to quote some of the things, and Peter knew that he had never heard any Bolshevik talk more outrageous than that. It made one realize more than ever how complicated this red problem was, for Guffy insisted, in spite of everything, that every word out of the Bible was immune. Up in Winnipeg, said he, they indicted a clergyman for quoting two passages from the prophet
Isaiah, but they couldn't face it. They had to let the fellow go. And the same thing was true of the Declaration of Independence. Anybody might read it, no matter how seditious it was. And the same thing was true of the Constitution, even though the part, called the Bill of Rights,
declared that everybody in America might do all the things that Guffy's office was sending them to jail for doing. This seemed a plain crazy proposition. But Guffy explained it as a matter of politics. If they went too far, these fellows would go out and capture the votes from them, and
maybe take away the government from them. And where would they be then? Peter had never paid any attention to politics before this, but both he and Gladys realized after this lecture that they must broaden their viewpoint. It was not enough to put the Reds in jail and crack their skulls.
You had to keep the public's sympathy for what you were doing. You had to make the public understand that it was necessary. You had to carry on what was called propaganda, to keep the public aware of the odiousness of these cattle and the desperate nature of their purposes. The man who perceived that most clearly was the Attorney General of the country, and Guffy
in his lecture pointed out the double nature of his activities. Not merely was the Attorney General breaking up the Communist and the Communist Labour Parties and sending their members to jail, he was using the funds of his office to send out an endless stream of propaganda, to keep the country frightened about these Red plots. Right now he had men in American City working over the data which Guffy had collected, and
every week or two he would make a speech somewhere, or would issue a statement to the newspapers telling of new bomb plots and new conspiracies to overthrow the government. And how clever he was about it. He would get the pictures of the very worst looking of the Reds, pictures taken after they had been kept in jail for weeks without a shave, and with a third degree to spoil
their tempers. And these pictures would be spread on a sheet with the caption, Men like these would rule you. This would be sent to 10,000 country newspapers all over the nation and 9900 would publish it and 99 million Americans would want to murder the Reds next morning.
So successful had this plan proven that the Attorney General was expecting to be nominated for President by means of it, and all the agencies of his department were working to that end. The same thing was being done by all the other agencies of big business all over the country. The Improve America League of American City was publishing full page advertisements in
the Times, and the Home and Fireside Association of El Dorado was doing the same thing in the El Dorado Times, and the Patriots Defense Legion was doing the same thing in the Flagland Banner. They were investigating the records of all political candidates, and if any of them showed the faintest tinge of pink, Guffey's office would set to work to rake up their records
and get up scandals on them, and the businessmen would contribute a big campaign fund and these candidates would be snowed under at the polls. That was the kind of work they were doing, and all Guffey's operatives must bear in mind the importance of it, and must never take any step that would hamper this political campaign, this propaganda on behalf of law and order.
Section 85 Peter went out from this conference a sober man, realizing for the first time his responsibilities as a voter and a shepherd to other voters. Peter agreed with Gladys that his views had been too narrow, his conception of the duties of a secret agent had been of the pre-war order.
Now he must realize that the world was changed. Now in this new world made safe for democracy, the secret agent was the real ruler of society, the real master of affairs, the trustee as it were for civilization. Peter and his wife must take up this new role and make themselves fit for it. They ought of course not to be moved by personal considerations, but at the same time they
must recognize the fact that this higher role would be of great advantage to them, it would enable them to move up in the world, to meet the best people. Through five or six years of her young life Gladys had sat polishing the fingernails and fondling the soft white hands of the genteel, and always a fire of determination had burnt in her breast that someday she would belong to this world of gentility.
She would meet these people not as an employee, but as an equal, she would not merely hold their hands, but would have them hold hers. Now the chance had come, she had a little talk with Guffy and Guffy said it would be a good idea and he would speak to Billy Nash, the secretary of the improve America league, and he did so and the next week the American City Times announced that on the following
Sunday evening the men's Bible class of the Bethlehem Church would have an interesting meeting. It would be addressed by an undercover operative of the government, a former red who had been for many years a most dangerous agitator, but had seen the error of his ways and had made amends by giving his services to the government in the recent IWW trials.
The Bethlehem Church didn't amount to very much, it was an obscure sect like the Holy Rollers, but Gladys had been shrewd and had insisted that you mustn't try to climb to the top of the mountain in one step. Peter must first try it on the dog, and if he failed, there would be no great harm done. But Gladys worked just as hard to make a success of this lecture as if they had been going
into real society. She spent several days getting up her costume and Peter's, and she spent a whole day getting her toilet ready, and before they set out, she spent at least an hour putting the finishing touches upon herself in front of a mirror and seeing that Peter was proper in every detail.
When Mr Nash introduced her personally to the Reverend Zebediah Muggins, and when this apostle of the Second Advent came out upon the platform and introduced her husband to the crowded working class audience, Gladys was so aquiver with delight that it was more a pain than a pleasure. Peter did not do perfectly of course, he lost himself a few times and stammered and floundered
about, but he remembered Gladys' advice, if he got stuck, to smile and explain that he had never spoken in public before. So everything went along nicely and everybody in the men's Bible class was aghast at the incredible revelations of this ex-red and secret agent of law and order. So next week Peter was invited again, this time by the Young Saints League, and when
he made good there he was drafted by the Admin's Association and then by the Crackers and Cheese Club. By this time he had acquired what Gladys called Savoir Faire. His fame spread rapidly and at last came the Supreme Hour. He was summoned to Park Avenue to address the members of the Friendly Society, a parish
organization of the Church of the Divine Compassion. This was the goal upon which the eyes of Gladys had been fixed. This was the time that really counted and Peter was groomed and rehearsed all over again. Their home was only a few blocks from the church, but Gladys insisted that they must positively arrive in a taxi cab, and when they entered the parish hall and the Reverend
de Willoughby's Stutterbridge, that exquisite, almost English gentleman came up and shook hands with them, Gladys knew that she had at last arrived. The clergyman himself escorted her to the platform and after he had introduced Peter, he seated himself beside her, thus definitely putting a seal upon her social position. Peter having learned his lecture by heart, having found out just what brought laughter
and what brought tears and what brought patriotic applause was now an assured success. After the lecture he answered questions and two clerks in the employ of Billy Nash passed around membership cards of the Improve America League, membership dues $5 a year, sustaining membership $25 a year, life membership $200 cash. Peter was shaken hands with by members of the most exclusive social set in American
City and told by them all to keep it up, his country needed him. There was an account of his lecture in the Times and the morning after there was an editorial about his revelations with the moral, join the Improve America League. Section 86. That second morning when Peter got to his office he found a letter waiting for him,
written on very conspicuous and expensive stationery and addressed in a woman's tall and sharp pointed handwriting. Peter opened it and got a start, for at the top of the letter was some kind of crest and a Latin inscription and the words, Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution. The letter informed him by the hand of a secretary that Mrs. Warren Sammy requested that Mr.
Peter Gudge would be so good as to call upon her that afternoon at three o'clock. Peter studied the letter and tried to figure out what kind of red this was. He was impressed by the stationery and the regal tone, but that word, Revolution, was one of the forbidden words. Mrs. Warren Sammy must be one of the parlor reds, like Mrs. God.
So Peter took the letter to McGivney and said suspiciously, what kind of a red plot is this? McGivney read the letter and said, red plot? How do you mean? Why? Explained Peter.
It says, Daughters of the American Revolution. And McGivney looked at him. At first he thought Peter was joking, but when he saw that the fellow was really in earnest he guffawed in his face. You boob! he said.
Didn't you ever hear of the American Revolution? Don't you know anything about the Fourth of July? Just then the telephone rang and interrupted them, and McGivney shoved the letter to him saying, ask your wife about it. So when Gladys came in, Peter gave her the letter and she was much excited.
It appeared that Mrs. Warren Sammy was a very tip-top society lady in American City, and this American Revolution of which she was a daughter was a perfectly respectable revolution that had happened a long time ago. The very best people belonged to it, and it was legal and proper to write about it, and even to put on your letterheads.
Peter must go home and get himself into his best clothes at once, and telephone to the secretary that he would be pleased to call upon Mrs. Warren Sammy at the hour indicated. Incidentally, there were a few more things for Peter to study. He must get a copy of the social register, Who's Who in American City, and he must get a history of his country and learn about the Declaration of Independence, and what
was the difference between a revolution that happened a long time ago and one that was happening now. So Peter went to call on the Great Society Lady in her Greystone Mansion and found her every bit as opulent as Mrs. God with the addition that she respected her own social position.
She did not make the mistake of treating Peter as an equal, so it did not occur to Peter that he might settle down permanently in her home. Her purpose was to tell Peter that she had heard of his lecture about the Red Menace, and that she was chairman of the board of directors of the Lady Patronesses of the Home for Disabled War Veterans in American City, and she wanted to arrange to have Peter deliver
this lecture to the veterans. And Peter, instructed in advance by Gladys, said that he would be very glad to donate his lecture as a patriotic contribution. Mrs. Warren Sammy thanked him gravely in the name of his country, and said she would let him know the date.
Peter went home and Gladys made a wry face because the lecture was to be delivered before a lot of good-for-nothing soldiers in some hall when it had been her hope that it was to be delivered to the daughters themselves and in Mrs. Warren Sammy's home. However, to have attracted Mrs. Warren Sammy's attention for anything was in itself a triumph. So Gladys was soon cheerful again, and she told Peter about Mrs. Warren Sammy's life.
One picked up such valuable knowledge in the gossip at the manicure parlours, it appeared. Then being in a friendly mood, Gladys talked to Peter about himself. They had mounted to a height from which they could look back upon the past and see it as a whole, and in the intimacy and confidence of their domestic partnership they could draw lessons from their mistakes and plan their future wisely.
Peter had made many blunders. He must surely admit that. Did Peter admit that? Yes, Peter did. But, continued Gladys, he had struggled bravely, and he had the supreme good fortune to have
secured for himself that greatest of life's blessings, the cooperation of a good and capable woman. Gladys was very emphatic about this latter, and Peter agreed with her. He agreed also, when she stated, that it is the duty of a good and capable wife to protect her husband for the balance of their life's journey, so that he would be able to avoid
the traps which his enemies set for his feet. Peter, having learned by bitter experience, would never again go chasing after a pretty face and wake up next morning to find his pockets empty. Peter admitted this too. As this conversation progressed, he realised that the tour of his triumph of life had become
a thing entirely of his wife's creation. At least, he realised that there would be no use in trying to change his wife's conviction on the subject. Likewise, he meekly accepted her prophecies as to his future conduct. He would bring home his salary at the end of each week, and his wife would use it, together
with her own salary, to improve the appearance and tone of both of them, and to aid them to climb to a higher social position. Peter, following his wife's careful instructions, has already become more dignified in his speech, more grave in his movements. She tells him that the future of society depends upon his knowledge and his skill,
and he agrees to this also. He has learned what you can do, and what you had better not do. He will never again cross the deadline into crime, or take chances with experiments in blackmail. He will try no more freelance work under the evil influence of low creatures like Neldulen,
but will stand in with the machine, and bear in mind that honesty is the best policy. He will steadily progress, he will meet the big men of the country, and will go to them, not cringing and twisting his hat in his hands, but with quiet self-possession. He will meet the agents of the Attorney General aspiring to become President, and will furnish them with material for their weekly Red Scares.
He will meet legislators who want to unseat elected socialists, and governors who wish to jail the leaders of outlaw strikes. He will meet magazine writers getting up articles, and popular novelists looking for local red color. But Peter's best bit of all will be as a lecturer.
He will be able to travel all over the country making a sensation. Did he know why? No, Peter answered. He was not sure he did. Well, Gladys could tell him.
It was because he was romantic. Peter didn't know just what this word meant, but it sounded flattering, so he smiled sheepishly, showing his crooked teeth, and asked how Gladys found out that he was romantic. The reply was a sudden order for him to stand up and turn around slowly. Peter didn't like to get up from his comfortable Morris chair, but he did what his wife asked
him. She inspected him on all sides and exclaimed, Peter, you must go on a diet. You're getting ombong poing. She said this in horrified tones, and Peter was frightened, because it sounded like a
disease. But Gladys added, You cannot be a romantic figure on a lecture platform if you've got a bay window. Peter found it interesting to be talked about, so he asked again why Gladys thought he was romantic.
There were several reasons, she said, but the main one was that he had been a dangerous criminal and had reformed, which pleased the church people. He had made a happy ending by marriage, which pleased those who read novels. Is that so? said Peter, guilelessly, and she assured him that it was. And what else? he asked, and she explained that he had known intimately and at first
those dreadful and dangerous people, those ogres of the modern world, the Bolsheviks, about whom the average man and woman learned only through the newspapers. And not merely did he tell a sensational story, but he ended it with a money-making lesson. The lesson was, contribute to the Improve America League. Make out your checks to the Home and Fireside Association.
The existence of your country depends upon your sustaining the Patriots' Defense Legion. So the fame of Peter's lectures would spread, and the Guffies and Billy Nash's of every city and town in America would clamor for him to come, and when he came the newspapers would publish his picture, and he and his wife would be welcomed by leaders of the best society.
They would become social lions and would see the homes of the rich and gradually become one of the rich. Gladys looked her spouse over again as they started to their sleeping apartment. Yes, he was undoubtedly putting on ombong poing. He would have to take up golf.
He was wearing a little American flag dangling from his watch chain, and she wondered if that wasn't a trifle crude. Gladys herself now wore a real diamond ring and had learned to say, Vaz and Bath. She yawned prettily as she took off her lovely brown tailormaid and reflected that such things come with ease and security.
Both she and Peter now had these in full measure. They had lost all fear of ever finding themselves out of a job. They had come to understand that the Red Menace is not so easily to be exterminated. It is a distemper that lurks in the blood of society. It breaks out every now and then in a new rash.
Gladys had come to agree with the Reds to this extent, that so long as there is a class of the rich and prosperous, so long there will be social discontent, so long there will be some that make their living by agitating, denouncing and crying out for change. Society is like a garden. Each year when you plant your vegetables there springs up also a crop of weeds, and you have
to go down the rows and chop off the heads of these weeds. Gladys's husband is an expert gardener. He knows how to chop weeds. And he knows that society will never be able to dispense with his services. So long as gardening continues, Peter will be a head weed chopper and a teacher of classes
of young weed choppers. Ah, it was fine to have married such a man. It was the reward a good woman received for helping her husband, making him into a good citizen, a patriot and an upholder of law and order. For all this of course, those who owned the garden would see that their head weed chopper
was taken care of and had his share of the best that the garden produced. Gladys stood before her looking glass, braiding her hair for the night and thinking of the things she would ask from this garden. She and Peter had earned, and they would demand the sweetest flowers, the most luscious fruits. Suddenly, Gladys stretched wide her arms in an ecstasy of realization.
We're a success, Peter, we're a success. We'll have money and all the lovely things that we'll buy. Do you realize, Peter, what a hit you've made? Peter saw her face of joy, but he was a tiny bit frightened and uncertain because of this unusual sharing of the honors.
So Gladys was impelled to affection, mingled with pity. She held out her arms to him. Poor dear Peter, he's had such a hard life. It was cruel he didn't have me sooner to help him. And then Gladys reflected for a moment and was moved to another outburst.
Just think, Peter, how wonderful it is to be an American. In America you can always rise if you do your duty. America is the land of the free. Your example of a poor boy's success ought to convince even the full Reds that they're wrong, that any boy can rise if he works hard.
Why, I've heard it said that in America the poorest boy can rise to be president. How would you like to be president, Peter? Peter hesitated. He doubted if he was equal to that big job, but he knew that it would not please Gladys for him to say so.
He murmured, perhaps, someday. Anyhow Peter, his wife continued, I'm for this country. I'm an American. And this time Peter didn't have to hesitate. You bet, he said, and added his favorite formula, 100%.
End of sections 84 to 86. The author has written a lengthy appendix detailing how most of the characters and incidents in 100% are based on actual persons and events. However this appendix is not included in this audio transcription. End of 100%, The Story of a Patriot, read by Anthony St. Pierre, Toronto, March 2025.
