Question! Question!

For a painful hour last week, Candidate Henry Wallace met the press—and seemed to do his best to discredit himself completely with it. Publicists for his "Progressive Party" (see NATIONAL AFFAIRS) had hopefully billed the session in Philadelphia's Bellevue-Stratford Hotel as a press conference, but it quickly degenerated into a battle between a pale, harried Wallace and red-faced, angry newsmen.

Wallace started by getting the wrong foot in his mouth. He read a letter by George Polk, the CBS correspondent whose murder in Greece (TIME, May 24, July 5) is still unsolved. Next he attacked Newsweek (Folk's former employer), CBS and the press in general for not doing enough to clear up the crime. Perhaps he was trying to ingratiate himself with the newsmen by showing concern for their rights; more probably he was chiding them. In any case, he made the correspondents angry. Wrote Britain's discerning Rebecca West: ". . . Never have I seen ... such a miracle of tactlessness..."

Wallace ruled out questions on Communism and his Communist party-lining before they could be thrown at him. No matter how hard the reporters tried, he said, "I am not going to engage in Red-baiting . . ." That still left one interesting question: Did Wallace write (in 1934) the fawning, fantastic Guru letters, full of schoolboy mysticism and "secret" pet names, to the late Nicholas Roerich, a fork-bearded Russian artist, explorer, and cultist (TIME, Dec. 29)? For months Columnist Westbrook Pegler had been trying to provoke a yes or no from Wallace.

What's a Guru? A reporter rose and put the question to Wallace. "I never discuss Westbrook Pegler in public," retorted Wallace.

Two more reporters popped the question, and were brushed aside. Then a paunchy, scowling ex-sportwriter tried his hand. His own version of what happened next: "... A tall, not unhandsome chap arose, a man of spiritual mien and prematurely grey, arose to declare: 'My name is Westbrook Pegler, Mr. Wallace . . . You have reminded us journalists of the important duty of getting all the available facts. Therefore, I ask you to say whether you did or did not write certain letters . . .'

" 'I never engage in any discussion whatsoever with Westbrook Pegler,' Bubblehead* replied . . ."

Who's a Stooge? Pegler sat down. All the correspondents had agreed to ask only one question apiece. To three others who also put the Gurusome question Wallace snapped: "I never engage in a discussion with a stooge of Westbrook Pegler." Finally a watery-eyed oldster got up. "My name is Mencken, H. L.," he announced. "Will you call me a stooge of Pegler?"

"H. L. Mencken," said Wallace ingratiatingly, "is nobody's stooge."

"Then, will you tell me—did you write them?"

"I will handle that in my own way and in my own time," said Wallace.

At last the Communist New York Daily Worker's Rob F. Hall went to the rescue by asking Wallace to discuss "progressive capitalism." After that, wrote Pegler, "the incident dissolved in a cloud of Oriental incense and a faint, distant tinkle of Chinese gongs."