The thing that had been buried in Emil Tesla and that used to rumble
under his fawning words, had come to life one day with two men twisting
his wrists and hammering at his uncovered face. He had laughed.
The two men came into his office to seize him. When he started to
protest they walked up to him slowly as if to shake hands. Instead, they
began beating him. For a moment he wondered why the two men hated him so
violently. He stood looking into their faces and thinking, "They're like
me."
The visitors, however, saw no resemblance. They twisted his arm till it
broke. Then they kept on battering at him with their fists till he fell
to the floor. While he lay on the floor they kicked him, and his muscles
grew paralyzed.
He never remembered the walk downstairs. But in the open he saw a crowd
of faces drifting excitedly beneath him. This was a scene he remembered
later.
It was while looking at the faces that he had grown strong. He laughed
because it occurred to him at the moment he was unconquerable. Later, in
prison, he often thought, "I have only my life to lose. I'm not afraid
of that. When they hit me they were hitting at an idea. But they could
only hit me. They couldn't touch the idea. I'll remember when I come
out--they can only hit me. If they end by shooting me they'll not touch
the idea even then. That's something beyond their fists and guns. I'll
remember I'm only a shadow."
A year passed and Tesla came out. He returned to the office of _The
Cry_. His friends noticed a change. He had grown quiet. He no longer
bubbled with words. His eyes looked straight at people who spoke to him.
His manner whispered, "I'm nothing--a shadow thrown by an idea. I don't
argue, and I'm not afraid. I'm part of masses of people all over the
world and cannot be destroyed."
The new Tesla became a leader. Among the radicals whose intellects were
groping noisily with the idea of a new justice he often inspired a fear.
His smile disquieted them and their arguments. His smile said, "Here,
what's the use of arguing? There is no argument. It isn't words we must
give the revolution, but lives. I'm ready. Here's mine."
When he looked at men and women who vociferated in the councils of
radical pamphleteers, workers, organizers, theorists, new party
politicians, Tesla thought, "That one's afraid. He's only a logician.
His mind has led him into revolution. If he changed his mind he would
become a conservative.... There's one that isn't afraid. He's like me.
His mind helps him. But no matter what his mind told him he would
always be in the revolution. Something in him drives him...."
For the rabble of artists and near-artists drifting by the scores into
radical centers, Tesla held a respectful dislike.
"He's in revolt because he must find something different than other
people," he thought of most of them. "The revolution to him means only
himself. It's something he can use to make himself felt more by people.
And also he's a revolutionist because of the contrariness in him that
artists usually have. Especially artists who, when they can't create new
things, make themselves think they're creating new things by destroying
old things."
Of himself Tesla thought, "I'll fight and not mind if I'm killed.
Because people will still be left alive, and so the idea of which I'm a
part will continue to live."
In the days before his going to prison Tesla had felt the need of
writing and talking his revolution. This was because of an impatience
and intolerance toward the enemy. Now that was gone. The enemy had
become a blatant, trivial thing. The things it said and did were
unimportant. He read with amusement the rabid denunciations of the
radicals in the press of the day. The grotesque hate hymns against the
new Russia, the garbled shriekings and pompous anathemas that fell
hourly upon the heads of all suspects, inspired no argument in him.
Tesla's days were busy with organization. He had almost ceased his
activities as pamphleteer, although still editor of _The Cry_. With a
group of men, silent as himself, he worked at the radicalization of the
factories and labor unions. Each day men left Tesla to seek employment
in shops throughout the country, in mines and mills. Their duties were
simple. Tesla measured them carefully before sending them on.... This
one could be relied upon to work intelligently, to talk to workingmen at
their benches and during noon hours without antagonizing, or, worse,
frightening them. Another was dubious. His eyes were too bright. He
would be discovered and arrested by the company. But he might do some
good. The arrest of a radical always did some good to the cause. Where
would Christianity have been without the incompetent agitators who
blundered into the clutches of the Roman law and the amphitheater?
Aloud he would say, "Work carefully. Remember that the revolution is for
all; that the workers, no matter what they say to you, are comrades.
Remember that strikes are better than fights. The time hasn't come yet
for fighting. What we must do is put into the hearts of the workers the
knowledge that there is nothing in common between them and their bosses.
The workers are the producers. They work and make no money. The bosses
are the exploiters. They don't work and make all the money. If you get
the workers to thinking this they'll want more money themselves and
declare strikes. By strikes we can paralyze industry and give the
workers consciousness of their power. This is only a step; but the first
and most important step. Make strikes. Make dissatisfaction. But don't
argue about fighting and revolution."
Over and over Tesla repeated his instructions through the days. He spoke
simply. Men listened to him and nodded without questioning. They saw
that his eyes were unafraid and that if he was sending them upon
dangerous missions, he would some day reserve a greater mission for
himself. Tesla had become a leader since he had laughed on the step
overlooking the pack of faces.