Root of His Evil Read Free Page A

wasn’t so hot. Maybe Italy didn’t think so.”
    “That’s very sweet of you.”
    The girls lost interest when I said he was a reporter, as that seemed the simplest way out, but I could feel him following me about with his eyes wherever I went. More customers came in, so we didn’t get any more chance to talk. When he left, a half dollar was on the table.

Two
    I TELL ALL THIS to refute insinuations that were made, that I knew all about Grant, and took advantage of him from the start. The truth is I knew almost nothing about him, and what was said at our first meeting, it seems to me, proves that he acted very mysteriously with me, from the very beginning, and in spite of many peculiar hints, told me almost nothing about himself, and in fact concealed the main things from me. He did that, I know now, from modesty, and from being sick and tired of having people get excited over who he was, and from not being able to see that it made much difference anyway, since regardless of who he was he was not what he wanted to be, or even headed in that direction. However, I should like to make it clear that regardless of his motives, he did practice concealment. Now then, why didn’t I compel him to be more candid? Why was I content to be kept in the dark? That part I shall explain too, when I get to it, and merely say at this point that there was a reason, equally strong to me as his reasons were to him, and yet nothing I need be ashamed of. I want it understood that until the terrible storm broke, Grant and I were practically strangers to each other, intimate and yet barely acquainted. It set me thinking about social customs in a way I never did before, of the importance of introductions and mutual friends and the various guarantees that people receive concerning each other.
    We had the big meeting that night, and Lula and I went, and I must confess I wondered if Grant would come, which surprised me, for one does not as a rule think much about customers after working hours. Once in the hall, however, I was in the midst of events which transpired so rapidly and unexpectedly that he was momentarily driven from my mind.
    In general, I criticize all labor activities for being most inefficient and slipshod, and the meeting in Reliance Hall that night was no exception. There were 473 girls present, as my records later showed, all anxious to organize and get it over with. But just as most of them had found seats, word came that the girls of the Borough Hall restaurant in Brooklyn, who had previously been lukewarm, had decided to join, and were on their way over in a big bus, and that the meeting would wait for them. Why that had to be was never explained. So we marked time, and there were speeches, the gentlemen from the main council went into a huddle at one end of the platform, and nobody seemed really to be in charge, although a union lady from out of town was in the chair. All this gave time for factions to develop. Particularly there was a girl from the Union Square restaurant, by the name of Clara Gruber, who had a great deal to say about the full social value of our labor, which meant nothing to me, and in a few minutes, a lot of them were yelling for her to be president. This annoyed the girls from the Lower Broadway place, who were going to put me up for president.
    So very soon the meeting was split into two groups, one yelling for me, the other for Clara Gruber, and in a very disorderly manner, with names being called. So as soon as I could get the attention of the lady in the chair, I got up and declined the nomination, if indeed there had been any nomination, for there didn’t seem to be any rules or motions or anything you could go by. This made things still worse, and the faction in favor of me threatened to secede. So then I hurriedly whispered to Lula and had her get up and say that if Clara Gruber was going to be president, then I had to be secretary-treasurer. My object in this was that I thought if our side had the