Chapter 3
VII. Suddenly the man reached out and grasped one of Peter's hands. He twisted the wrist again, the sore wrist which still ached from the torture. Will you tell?" I'd tell if I could, screamed Peter.
My God, how can I? Don't lie to me, hissed the man. I know about it now. You can't fool me. You know Jim Goober."
I never heard of him, wailed Peter. You lie, declared the other, and he gave Peter's wrist a twist. Yes, yes, I know him, shrieked Peter. Oh, that's more like it, said the other. Of course you know him.
What sort of a looking man is he? I don't know, he's a big man. You lie, you know he's a medium-sized man. He's a medium-sized man. A dark man?
Yes, a dark man. And you know Mrs. Goober, the music teacher? Yes, I know her. And you've been to her house? Yes, I've been to her house.
Where is their house? I don't know. That is, it's on Fourth Street? Yes, it's on Fourth Street. And he hired you to carry that suitcase with the bombs in it, didn't he?
Yes, he hired me. And he told you what was in it, didn't he? He, he, that is, I don't know. You don't know whether he told you? Yes, he told me.
You knew all about the plot, didn't you? Yes, I knew. And you know Isaacs, the Jew? Yes, I know him. He was the fellow that drove the jitney, wasn't he?
Yes, he drove the jitney. Where did he drive it? He drove it everywhere. He drove it over here with the suitcase, didn't he? Yes, he did.
And you know Biddle, and you know what he did, don't you? Yes, I know. And you're willing to tell all you know about it, are you? Yes, I'll tell it all. I'll tell whatever you, you'll tell whatever you know, will you?
Yes, sir. And you'll stand by it? You'll not try to back out? You don't want to go back into the hole? No, sir.
And suddenly Guffy pulled from his pocket a paper folded up. It was several typewritten sheets. Peter Gudge, he said. I've been looking up your record and I've found out what you did in this case. You'll see when you read how perfectly I've got it.
You won't find a single mistake in it. Guffy meant this for wit, but poor Peter was too far gone with terror to have any idea that there was such a thing as a smile in the world. This is your story, d'you see? continued Guffy.
Now take it and read it. So Peter took the paper in his trembling hand, the one which had not been twisted lame. He tried to read it, but his hand shook so that he had to put it on his knee, and then he discovered that his eyes had not yet got used to the light. He could not see the print.
I can't, he wailed. And the other man took the paper from him. I'll read it to you, he said. Now you listen. And put your mind on it and make sure I've got it all right.
And so Guffy started to read an elaborate legal document. I, Peter Gudge, being duly sworn, do depose and declare, and so on. It was an elaborate and detailed story about a man named Jim Goober and his wife and three other men and how they had employed Peter to buy for them certain materials to make bombs and how Peter had helped them to make the bombs in a certain room at a certain given
address and how they had put the bombs in a suitcase with a time clock to set them off and how Isaacs, the jitney driver, had driven them to a certain corner on Main Street and how they had left the suitcase with the bombs on the street in front of the Preparedness Day Parade. It was very simple and clear and Peter, as he listened, was almost ready to cry with
delight, realizing that this was all he had to do to escape from this horrible predicament. He knew now what he was supposed to know, and he knew it. Why had not Guffy told him long ago, so that he might have known it without having his fingers bent out of place and his wrist twisted off? Now then, said Guffy, that's your confession, is it?
Yes, said Peter. And you'll stand by it to the end? Yes, sir. We can count on you now. No more nonsense.
Yes, sir. You'll swear it's all true? I do. And you won't let anybody persuade you to go back on it, no matter what they say to you?
No, sir, said Peter. All right, said Guffy. And his voice showed the relief of a businessman who had closed an important deal. He became almost human as lie went on. Now, Peter, he said, you're our man, and we're going to count on you.
You understand, of course, that we have to hold you as a witness, but you're not going to be a prisoner, and we're going to treat you well. We'll put you up in the hospital part of the jail, and you'll have good grub and nothing to do. In a week or so, we'll want you to appear before the grand jury.
Meantime, you understand, not a word to a soul. People may try to worm something out of you, but don't you open your mouth about this case except to me. I'm your boss, and I'll tell you what to do, and I'll take care of you all the way. You got that all straight?
Yes, sir, said Peter. Section 8 There was once, so legend declares, a darky who said that he liked to stub his toe because it felt so good when it stopped hurting. On this same principle, Peter had a happy time in the hospital of the American City
Jail. He had a comfortable bed and plenty to eat and absolutely nothing to do. His sore joints became gradually healed, and he gained half a pound a day in weight, and his busy mind set to work to study the circumstances about him to find out how he could perpetuate these comfortable conditions and add to them the little luxuries which
make life really worth living. In charge of this hospital was an old man by the name of Dubman. He had been appointed because he was the uncle of an alderman, and he had held the job for the last six years and during that time had gained weight almost as rapidly as Peter was gaining.
He had now come to a condition where he did not like to get out of his armchair if it could be avoided. Peter discovered this and so found it possible to make himself useful in small ways. Also, Mr. Dubman had a secret vice. He took snuff.
And for the sake of discipline, he did not want this dreadful fact to become known. Therefore, he would wait until everybody's back was turned before he took a pinch of snuff. And Peter learned this and would tactfully turn his back. Everybody in this hospital had some secret vice, and it was Mr. Dubman's duty to repress
the vices of the others. The inmates of the hospital included many of the prisoners who had money and could pay to make themselves comfortable. They wanted tobacco, whiskey, cocaine and other drugs, and some of them wanted a chance to practice unnameable horrors.
All the money they could smuggle in they were ready to spend for license to indulge themselves. As for the attendants in the hospital, they were all political appointees, derelicts who had been unable to hold a job in the commercial world and had sought an easy birth, like Peter himself. They took bribes and were prepared to bribe Peter to outwit Mr. Dubman.
Mr. Dubman, on the other hand, was prepared to reward Peter with many favors, if Peter would consent to bring him secret information. In such a situation, it was possible for a man with his wits about him to accumulate quite a little capital. For the most part, Peter stuck by Dubman, having learned by bitter experience that in
the long run it pays to be honest. Dubman was referred to by the other attendants as the Old Man, and always in Peter's life from the very dawn of childhood there had been some such Old Man, the fountainhead of authority, the dispenser of creature comforts. First had been Old Man Drub, who from early morning till late at night wore green spectacles
and a sign across his chest, I am blind, and made a weary little child lead him through the streets by the hand. At night, when they got home to their garret room, Old Man Drub would take off his green goggles and was perfectly able to see Peter, and if Peter had made the slightest mistake during the day, he would beat him.
When Drub was arrested, Peter was taken to the orphan asylum, and there was another Old Man, and the same harsh lesson of subservience had to be learned. Peter had run away from the asylum, and then had come Pericles Priam with his pain paralyser, and Peter had studied his whims and served his interests. When Pericles had married a rich widow and she had kicked Peter out, there had come the
temple of Jimjambot, where the Old Man had been Tushba Akrogaz, the Major Domo, terrible when he was thwarted, but a generous dispenser of favors when you had learned to flatter him, to play upon his weaknesses, to smooth the path of his pleasures. All these years Peter had been forced to crook the pregnant hinges of the knee. It had become an instinct within, an instinct that went back far behind the twenty years
of his conscious life, that went back twenty thousand years, perhaps ten times twenty thousand years, to a time when Peter had chipped flint spears at the mouth of some cave and broiled marrow bones for some Old Man of the Board, and seen rebellious young fellows cast out to fall prey to the sabertooth tiger. Section 9
Peter found that he was something of a personality in this hospital. He was the star witness in the sensational goober case about which the whole city, and in fact the whole country, was talking. It was known that he had turned states, but just what he knew and what he had told was a mighty secret, and Peter held his mouth and looked portentous, and enjoyed thrills
of self-importance. But meantime, there was no reason why he should not listen to others talk, no reason why he should not inform himself fully about this case, so that in future he might be able to take care of himself. He listened to what Old Man Doopman had to say, and to what Jan Christian, his Swedish
assistant, had to say, and to what Gerald Leslie, the Coke fiend, had to say. All these and others had friends on the outside, people who were in the know. Some told one thing, and others told exactly the opposite. But Peter put this and that together, and used his own intrigue-sharpened wits upon it, and before long he was satisfied that he had got the facts.
Jim Goober was a prominent labour leader. He had organised the employees of the Traction Trust, and had called and led a tremendous strike. Also, he had called building strikes, and some people said he had used dynamite upon uncompleted buildings and made a joke of it.
Anyhow, the businessmen of the city wanted to put him where he could no longer trouble And when some maniac unknown had flung a dynamite bomb into the path of the preparedness parade, the big fellows of the city had decided that now was the opportunity they were seeking. Guffey, the man who had taken charge of Peter, was head of the Secret Service of the Traction Trust, and the big fellows had put him in complete charge.
They wanted action, and would take no chances with the graft-ridden and incompetent police of the city. They had Goober in jail with his wife and three of his gang, and through the newspapers of the city they were carrying on a propaganda to prepare the public for the hanging of all five.
And that was all right, of course. Jim Goober was only a name to Peter, and of less importance than a single one of Peter's meals. Peter understood what Guffey had done, and his only grudge was because Guffey had not had the sense to tell him his story at the beginning, instead of first nearly twisting
his arm off. However, Peter reflected, no doubt Guffey had meant to teach him a lesson, to make sure of him. Peter had learned the lesson, and his purpose now was to make this clear to Guffey and to Duepman.
Hold your mouth, Guffey had said, and Peter never once said a word about the Goober case. But of course, he talked about other matters. A fellow could not go around like a mummy all day long, and it was Peter's weakness that he liked to tell about his exploits, the clever devices by which he had outwitted his last old man.
So to Gerald Leslie, the coke fiend, he told the story of Pericles Priam, and how many thousands of dollars he had helped to wheedle out of the public, and how twice he and Pericles had been arrested for swindling. Also he told about the Temple of Jim Jambo, and all the strange and incredible things that had gone on there.
Pastian El Calandra, who called himself the Chief Magistrian of Eleutherian exoticism, gave himself out to his followers to be 80 years of age, but as a matter of fact, he was less than 40. He was supposed to be a Persian prince, but had been born in a small town in Indiana, and had begun life as a grocer boy.
He was supposed to live upon a handful of fruit, but every day it had been Peter's job to assist in the preparation of a large beefsteak or a roast chicken. These were for sacrificial purposes, so the prophet explained to his attendants, and Peter would get the remains of the sacrificial beefsteaks and chickens, and would sacrificially devour them behind the pantry door.
That had been one of his private grafts, which he got in return for keeping secret from the but some of the stealings of Tushbar Akrugas, the major domo. A wonderful place had been this Temple of Jim Jambo. There were mystic altars with seven veils before them, and through these the Chief Magistrian would appear, clad in a long cream-coloured robe with gold and purple borders, and with
pink embroidered slippers and symbolic headdress. His lectures and religious rites had been attended by hundreds, many of them rich society women who came rolling up to the temple in their limousines. Also there had been a school, where children had been initiated into the mystic rites of the cult.
The prophet would take these children into his private apartments, and there were awful rumours which had ended in the raiding of the temple by the police, and the flight of the prophet and likewise the major domo, and of Peter Gudge, his scullion and confederate. Also Peter thought it was fun to tell Gerald Leslie about his adventures with the Holy Rollers into whose church he had drifted during his search for a job.
Peter had taken up with his sect and learned the art of talking in tongues and how to fall over the back of your chair in convulsions of celestial glory. Peter had gained the confidence of the Reverend Gamaliel Lunk and had been secretly employed by him to carry on a propaganda among the congregation to obtain a raise in salary for the underpaid convulsionist.
But certain things which Peter had learned had caused him to go over to the faction of Shoemaker-Smithers, who was trying to persuade the congregation that he could roll harder and faster than the Reverend Gamaliel. Peter had only held this latter job a few days before he had been fired for stealing the fried doughnut.
End of sections 7, 8 and 9
