In the Heart of a Fool Part 59

"That's just it," put in the Captain. "That's just what I said to Emmy this morning. I was out to see her after you left and stayed until Laura Van Dorn came and chased me off. Emmy's mighty happy, George--mighty, mighty happy--eh? Her mother always was that way. I was the one that was scared." George nodded a.s.sent. "But to-day--well, we just sat there and cried--she's so happy about it--eh? Wimmin, George, ain't scared a bit.

I know 'em. I've been in their kitchins for thirty years, George, and let me tell you somepin funny," continued the Captain. "Old Ahab Wright has taken to smoking in public to get the liberal vote! Let me tell you somepin else. They've decided to put the skids under Grant Adams and his gang down in the Valley, and the other day they ran into a snag. You know Calvin & Calvin are representing the owners since Tom's got this life job, though he's got all his money invested down there and still advises 'em. Well, anyway, they decided to put a barbed-wire trocha around all the mines and the factories. Well, four carloads of wire and posts shows up down in the Valley this week, and, 'y gory, man,--they can't get a carpenter in town or down there to touch it. Grant's got 'em sewed up. But Tom says he'll fix 'em one of these days, if they get before him in his court--what say?"

"I suppose he will, Captain," replied Mr. Brotherton, and took up his theme. "But getting back to the subject of children--I've been talking all morning about 'em to all kinds of folks, and I've decided the country's for 'em. Children, Cap," Mr. Brotherton rose, put on his coat and took the Captain's arm, "children, Captain," he repeated, as they reached the sidewalk and were starting for the street car, "children, I figure it out--children are the see-ment of civilization! Well, say--thus endeth the reading of the first lesson!"

As they stood in the corner transfer shed waiting for the car, Grant Adams came up. "Say, Grant," called Brotherton, "what you goin' to do about that barbed wire trocha?"

"Oh," smiled Grant, "I've just about settled it. The boys will begin on it this afternoon. A lot of them were angry when they heard what the owners were up to, but I said, 'Here: we've got justice on our side. We claim a partnership interest in all those mines and factories down there. We contend that we who labor there now are the legatees of all the labor that's been killed and maimed and cheated by long hours and low wages down in the Valley for thirty years, and if we have a partnership right in those mines and factories, it's our business to protect them.' So I talked the boys into putting up the trocha. I tell you, George," said Grant, and the tremor of emotion strained his voice as he spoke, "it won't be long until we'll have a partnership in that trocha, just as we'll have an interest in every hammer and bolt, and ledge and vein in the Valley. It's coming, and coming fast--the Democracy of Labor. I have faith, the men and women have faith--all over the Valley. We've found the right way--the way of peace. When labor has proved its efficiency--"

"Ah--you're crazy, Grant," snapped the Captain. "This cla.s.s of people down here--these ignorant foreigners--why, they couldn't run a peanut stand--eh?"

d.i.c.k Bowman and his son came up, and not knowing a discussion was in the wind, d.i.c.k shook hands around. And after the Captain had taken his uptown car, Grant stood apart, lost in thought, but d.i.c.k said: "Well, Benny, we got here in time for the car!" Then craning his long neck, the father laughed: "Ben, here's a laboring man and his shift goes on at one--so he's in a hurry, but we'll make it."

"d.i.c.k," began Brotherton, looking at the thin shadow of a man who was hardly Brotherton's elder by half a dozen years. "d.i.c.k, you're a kind of expert father, you and Joe Calvin, and to-day Joe's a granddaddy--tell me about the kiddies--are they worth it?"

Bowman threw his head back and craned his long neck. "Not for us--not for us poor--maybe for you people here," said Bowman, who paused and counted on his fingers: "Eight born, three dead--that's too many. Joe Calvin, he's raised all his and they're doing fairly well. That's his girl in here--ain't it?" Bowman sighed. "Her and my Jean played together back in their little days; before we moved to South Harvey." He lowered his voice.

"George, mother hasn't heard from Jean for going on two year, now. She went off with a fellow; told us she married him--she was just a child--but had been working around in the factories--and, well, I don't say so, but I guess she just has got where she's ashamed to write--maybe."

His voice rose in anger as he cried: "Why didn't she have a show, like this girl of Joe's? He's no better than I. And you know my wife--well, she's no Mrs. Joe Calvin--she's been as happy about 'em when they came as if they were princes of the blood." He stopped.

"Then there's Mugs--I dunno, George,--it seems like we tried with Mugs, but all them saloons and--well, the gambling and the women under his nose from the time he was ten years old--well, I can't make him work.

Little Jack is steady enough for a boy of twenty--he's in the Company mines, and we've put Ben in this year. He is twelve--though, for Heaven's sake, don't go blabbing it; he's supposed to be fourteen. And little Betty, she's in school yet. I don't know how she'll turn out. No, George," he went on, "children for us poor, children's a mighty risky, uncertain crop. But," he smiled reflectively, "I'm right here to tell you they're lots of fun as little shavers--growing up. Why, George, you ought to hear Benny sing. Them Copinis of the Hot Dog found he had a voice, and they've taught him some dago songs." Ben was a bright-faced boy of twelve--big for his age, with snappy, brown eyes and apples of cheeks and curly hair. He slipped away to look into a store window, leaving the two men alone. Mr. Brotherton was in a mellow mood. He put his great paw on the small man's shoulder and said huskily:

"Say, d.i.c.k, honest, I'd rather have just one boy like that than the whole d.a.m.n Valley--that's right!"

The car came bowling up and the South Harvey people boarded it. Grant Adams rode down into the Valley with great dreams in his soul. He talked little to the Bowmans, but looked out of the window and saw the dawn of another day. It is the curse of dreamers that they believe that when they are convinced of a truth, they who have pursued it, who have suffered for it, who have been exalted by it, they have only to pa.s.s out their truth to the world to remake the universe. But the world is made over only when the common mind sees the truth, and the common heart feels it. So the history of reform is a history of disappointment. The reform works, of course. But in working it does only the one little trick it is intended to do, and the long chain of incidental blessings which should follow, which the reformers feel must inevitably follow, wait for other reformers to bring them into being. So there is always plenty of work for the social tinker, and no one man ever built a millennium. For G.o.d is ever jealous for our progeny, and leaves an unfinished job always on the work bench of the world.

Grant Adams believed that he had a mission to bring labor into its own.

The coming of the Democracy of Labor was a real democracy to him--no mere shibboleth. And as he rode through the rows of wooden tenements, where he knew men and women were being crushed by the great industrial machine, he thought of the tents in the fields; of the women and children and of the old and the sick going out there to labor through the day to piece out the family wage and secure economic independence with wholesome, self-respecting work. It seemed to him that when he could bring the conditions that were starting in Harvey, to every great industrial center, one great job in the world would be done forever.

So he drummed his iron claw on the seat before him, put his hard hand upon his rough face, and smiled in the joy of his high faith.

d.i.c.k Bowman and his boy left Grant at the car. He waved his claw at little Ben when they parted, and sighed as he saw the little fellow scampering to shaft No. 3 of the Wahoo Fuel Company's mines. There Grant lost sight of the child, and went to his work. In two hours he and Violet Hogan had cleaned off his desk. He had promised the Wahoo Fuel Company to see that the work of constructing the trocha was started that afternoon, and when Violet had telephoned to Mechanics' Hall, Grant and a group of men went to the mines to begin on the trocha. They pa.s.sed down the switch into the yards, and Grant heard a brakeman say:

"That Frisco car there has a broken brake--watch out for her."

And a switchman reply:

"Yes--I know it. I tried to get the yardmaster not to send her down. But we'll do what we can."

The brakeman on the car signaled for the engineer to pull the other cars away, and leave the Frisco car at the top of a slight grade, to be shoved down by the men when another car was needed at the loading chute.

Grant walked toward the loading chute, and a roar from the falling coal filled his ears. He saw little Ben under a car throwing back the coal falling from the faulty chute on to the ground.

Through the roar Grant heard a yell as from a man in terror. He looked back of him and saw the Frisco car coming down the grade as if shot from a monster catapult!

"The boy--the boy--!" he heard the man on the car shriek. He tried to clamber over the coal to the edge of the car, but before he could reach the side, the Frisco car had hit the loading car a terrific blow, sending it a car length down the track.

One horrible scream was all they heard from little Ben. Grant was at his side in a moment. There, stuck to the rail, were two little legs and an arm. Grant stooped, picked up the little body, pulled it loose from the tracks, and carried it, running, to the company hospital.

As Grant ran, tears fell in the little, coal-stained face, and made white splotches on the child's cheeks.

CHAPTER XLV

IN WHICH LIDA BOWMAN CONSIDERS HER UNIVERSE AND TOM VAN DORN WINS ANOTHER VICTORY

For a long and weary night and a day of balancing doubt, and another dull night, little Ben Bowman lay limp and crumpled on his cot--a broken lump of clay hardly more than animate. Lida Bowman, his mother, all that time sat in the hall of the hospital outside the door of his room. The stream of sorrow that winds through a hospital pa.s.sed before her unheeded. Her husband came, sat with her silently for a while, went, and came again, many times. But she did not go. In the morning of the second day as she stood peering through the door crack at the child she saw his little body move in a deep sigh, and saw his black eyes open for a second and close as he smiled. Dr. Nesbit, who stood beside her, grasped her hand and led her away.

"I think the worst is over, Lida," he said, and held her hand as they walked down the hall. He sat with her in the waiting room, into which the earliest tide of visitors had not begun to flow, and promised her that if the child continued to rally from the shock, she might stand by his bed at noon. Then for the first time she wept. He stood by the window looking out at the great pillars of smoke that were smudging the dawn, at the smelter fumes that were staining the sky, at the hurrying crowd of men and women and children going into the mines, the mills, the shops, hurrying to work with the prod of fear ever in their backs--fear of the disgrace of want, fear of the shame of beggary, fear to hear some loved one ask for food or warmth or shelter and to have it not. When the great motherly body had ceased its paroxysms, he went to Mrs. Bowman and touched her shoulder.

"Lida," he said, "it isn't much--but I'm glad of one thing. My bill is on the statutes to give people who are hurt, as Ben was, their money from the company without going to law and dividing with the lawyers. It is on the books good and tight; referred to the people and approved by them and ground clear through the state supreme court and sustained. It isn't much, Lida--Heaven knows that--but little Ben will get his money without haggling and that money will help to start him in life."

She turned a tear-swollen face to him, but again her grief overcame her.

He stood with one wrinkled hand upon her broad shoulder, and with the other patted her coa.r.s.e hair. When she looked up at him, again he said gently:

"I know, Lida, that money isn't what you mothers want--but--"

"But we've got to think of it, Doc Jim--that's one of the curses of poverty, but, oh, money!--It won't bring them back strong and whole--who leave us to go to work, and come back all torn and mashed."

She sat choking down the sobs that came surging up from her great bosom, and weaving to and fro as she fought back her tears. The Doctor sat beside her and took her red unshapely hands unadorned except by the thin gold wedding ring that she had worn in toil for over thirty years.

"Lida, sometimes I think only G.o.d and the doctors know how heavy women's loads are," said the Doctor.

"Ain't that so--Doc Jim!" she cried. "Ain't that the truth? I've had a long time to think these two days and nights--and I've thought it all over and all out. Here I am nearly fifty and eight times you and I have fought it out with death and brought life into this world. I'm strong--I don't mind that. I joyed at their coming, and made the others edge over at the table, and snuggle up in the bed, and we've been happy. Even the three that are dead--I'm glad they came; I'm thankful for 'em. And d.i.c.k he's been so proud of each one, and cuddled it, and muched it--"

Her voice broke and she sobbed, "Oh, little Ben--little Ben, how pappy made over his hair--he was born with hair--don't you mind, Doc Jim?"

The Doctor laughed and looked into the past as he piped, "Curliest headed little tyke, and don't you remember Laura gave him Lila's baby things she'd saved for all those years?"

"Yes, Doc Jim--don't I? G.o.d knows, Doc, she's been a mother to the whole Valley--when I got up I found I was the twentieth woman up and down the Valley she'd given Lila's little things to--just to save our pride when she thought we would not take 'em any other way. Don't I know--all about it--and she's still doing it--G.o.d bless her, and she's been here every morning, noon and night since--since--she came with a little beef tea, or some of her own wine, or a plate of hot toast in her basket--that she made me eat. Why, if it wasn't for her and Henry and Violet and Grant--what would G.o.d's poor in this Valley do in trouble--I sure dunno."

There came an unsteady minute, when the Doctor stroked her hand and piped, "Well, Lida--you folks in the Valley don't get half the fun out of it that the others get. It's pie for them."

The woman folded her hands in her lap and sighed deeply. "Doc Jim," she began, "eight times I've brought life into this world. The three that went, went because we were poor--because we couldn't buy life for 'em.

They went into the mills and the mines with d.i.c.k's muscle. One is at home, waiting till the wheels get hungry for her. Four I've fed into the mills that grind up the meat we mothers make." She stared at him wildly and cried "O G.o.d--G.o.d, Doc Jim--what justice is there in it? I've been a kind of brood-mare bearing burden carriers for Dan Sands, who has sold my blood like cheese in his market. My mother sent three boys to the war who never came back and I've heard her cry and thank G.o.d He'd let her.

But my flesh and blood--the little ones that d.i.c.k and me have coddled and petted and babied--they've been fed into the wheels to make profits--profits for idlers to squander--profits to lure women to shame and men to death. That's what I've been giving my body and soul for, Doc Jim. Little Ben up there has given his legs and his arms--oh, those soft little arms and the cunning little legs I used to kiss--for what? I'll tell you--he's given them so that by saving a day's work repairing a car, some straw boss could make a showing to a superintendent, and the superintendent could make a record for economy to a president, and a president could increase dividends--dividends to be spent by idlers. And idleness makes drunkards who make harlots who make h.e.l.l--and all my little boy's arms and legs will go for is for sin and shame."

The Doctor returned to the window and she cried bitterly: "Oh, you know that's the truth--the G.o.d's truth, Doc Jim. Where's my Jean? She went into the gla.s.s factory--worked twelve hours a day on a job that would have crippled her for life in another year, and then went away with that Austrian blower--and when he threw her out, she was ashamed to write--and for a long time now I've read the city papers of them women who kill themselves--hoping to find she was dead. And Mugs--you know what South Harvey's made of him--"

She rose and walked to the window. Standing beside him she cried:

"I tell you, Doc Jim--I hate it." She pointed to the great black mills and mine shafts and the piles of brick and lumber and sheet iron that stretched before her for a mile. "I hate it, and I'm going to hit it once before I die. Don't talk peace to me. I've got a right to hit it and hit it hard--and if my time ever comes--"

A visitor was shown into the room, and Mrs. Bowman ceased speaking. She was calm when the Doctor left her and at noon she stood beside the cot, and saw little Ben smile at her. Then she went away in tears. As she pa.s.sed out of the door of the hospital into the street, she met Grant Adams coming in to inquire about little Ben.