In Dubious Battle (17 page)

“Yes. I can do it. Give me enough help and I can.” The sad eyes grew sadder. “Give me five gallons of crude carbolic and I’ll perfume the country for miles.”

“Good. Now, we’re moving the men today. You look ’em over as quick as you can. See there’s no contagion in any of ’em, will you? The health authorities are going to do plenty of snooping. If they can catch us off base, they’ll bounce us. They let us live like pigs in the jungle, but just the minute we start a strike, they get awful concerned about the public health.”

“All right, all right.”

Mac looked confused. “I busted right into a song, didn’t I? Well, you know what’s needed. Let’s go see London now.”

Three men sat on the steps of London’s room. They got up and moved aside for Mac. Inside, London was lying down, dozing. He rose up on his elbow. “Chroust! Is it morning?”

“It’s Christmas,” said Mac. “Mr. London, this here’s Doc Burton, Director of Public Health. He wants some men. How many you want, Doc?”

“Well, how many men are we going to handle?”

“Oh—between a thousand and fifteen hundred.”

“Better give me fifteen or twenty men, then.”

London called, “Hi, out there.” One of the sentinels opened the door and looked in. “Try find Sam, will you?”

“Sure.”

London said, “We called a meetin’ for ten o’clock this mornin’. Great big meetin’, I mean. I sent word to the other camps about this Anderson place. They’ll start movin’ in pretty soon.”

The door opened and Sam entered, his lean face sharp with curiosity.

“Sam, this here’s Doc Burton. He wants you for his right-hand. Go outside and tell the guys you want volunteers to help the Doc. Get twenty good men.”

“O.K., London. When you want ’em?”

Burton said, “Right now. We’ll go right over and lay out the camp. I can pile eight or nine in my old car. Get somebody with a car to take the rest.”

Sam glanced from London to Burton, and back to London to verify the authority. London nodded his big head. “That’s straight, Sam. Anything Doc says.”

Burton stood up to go with him. “I’d like to help pick the men.”

“Wait,” Mac said. “You’re all clear in town, aren’t you, Doc?”

“What do you mean ‘clear’?”

“I mean, is there anything they could hang a malpractice charge on you for?”

“Not that I know of. ’Course they can do anything if they want to bad enough.”

“Sure,” said Mac. “I know but it might take ’em some time. ’Bye, Doc. See you later.”

When Burton and Sam were gone, Mac turned to London. “He’s a good guy. Looks like a pansy with his pretty face, but he’s hard-boiled enough. And he’s thorough as croton oil. Got anything to eat, London?”

“Loaf of bread and some cheese.”

“Well, what are we waitin’ for? Jim and me forgot to eat last night.”

Jim said, “I woke up in the night and remembered.”

London brought a bag from the corner and laid out a loaf of bread and a slab of cheese. There was a stirring outside. The hum of voices that had been still for several hours broke out again. Doors opened and slammed. Men hacked their throats clear of mucous and spat and blew their noses. The clear day had come, and the sun was red through the windows.

Mac, talking around a mouthful of cheese, said, “London, what do you think of Dakin for general chairman of the strike committee and boss-in-chief?”

London looked a little disappointed. “Dakin’s a good guy,” he said. “I’ve knowed Dakin for a long time.”

Mac went into London’s disappointment and dug it out. “I’ll be straight with you, London. You’d be a hell of a good chairman, except you’d get mad. Now Dakin don’t look like a guy that would ever get mad. If the boss of this mess ever gets mad, we’re sunk.”

The attempt was successful. London agreed, “I get sore as hell. I get so damn mad it makes me sick. You’re straight about Dakin, too; he’s a gamblin’ kind of a man. Never opens up his eyes wide; never lets his voice get loose. The worse things gets, the quieter Dakin gets.”

Mac said, “Then when the meetin’ comes off, you throw your weight to Dakin, will you?”

“Sure.”

“I don’t know about this guy Burke, but I think with our guys and Dakin’s guys we could soft-pedal him if he gets rank. We better start the guys movin’ pretty soon; it’s quite a ways over there.”

London asked, “When you think the scabs’ll start comin’?”

“Not before tomorrow. I don’t think the bosses around here think we mean it yet. They can’t get in any scabs before tomorrow.”

“What we goin’ to do when they land?”

“Well,” said Mac. “We’ll meet the train an’ give ’em the keys of the city. I ought to have a wire before they start from town. Some of the boys’ll kind of be checkin’ up on the employment agencies.” He lifted his head and looked toward the door. The hum of voices outside had been casual and monotonous, and now it stopped altogether. Suddenly, through the silence, there came a catcall, and then other voices broke into shouts. There was an argument outside.

London stepped over to the door and opened it. The three sentinels stood side by side before the door, and in front of them stood the orchard superintendent in moleskin trousers and field boots. On either side of him stood a man wearing a deputy sheriff’s badge, and in each of his hands were shot-guns.

The superintendent looked over the heads of the guardians. “I want to talk to you, London.”

“You sure come with an olive-branch,” said London.

“Well, let me come in. Maybe we can work something out.” London looked at Mac, and Mac nodded. The great crowd of men was silent, listening. The ‘super’ stepped
forward, with his deputies beside him. The guards maintained their position. One of them said, “Let him leave his bulls outside, chief.”

“That’s a good idear,” said London. “You don’t need no buckshot to talk with.”

The ‘super’ glanced nervously about at the silent, threatening men. “What proof have I that you’ll play straight?” he demanded.

“Just about as much as I have that you will.”

The ‘super’ made his decision. “Stay outside and keep order,” he said.

Now the guardians stepped aside, letting the one man enter, and then resumed their position. The deputies were nervous. They stood fingering their guns and looking fiercely about them.

London closed the door. “I don’t know why you couldn’t say it outside, where the guys could hear.”

The ‘super’ saw Mac and Jim. He looked angrily at London. “Put those men out.”

“Uh-uh,” said London.

“Now look here, London, you don’t know what you’re doing. I’m offering you the chance to go back to work if you kick those men out.”

“What for?” London asked. “They’re good guys.”

“They’re reds. They’re getting a lot of good men into trouble. They don’t give a
damn
about you men if they can start trouble. Get rid of ’em and you can go back to work.”

London said, “S’pose we kick ’em out? Do we get the money we’re strikin’ for? Do we get what we would of got before the cut?”

“No; but you can go back to work with no more trouble.
The owners will overlook everything that’s happened.”

“Well, what good was the strike, then?”

The ‘super’ lowered his voice. “I’ll tell you what I’m prepared to offer. You get the men back to work and you’ll get a steady job here as assistant superintendent at five dollars a day.”

“And how about these guys, these friends of mine?”

“Fifty dollars apiece if they get out of the Valley.”

Jim looked at the heavy, brooding face of London. Mac was grinning meanly. London went on, “I like to see both sides. S’pose me an’ my friends here don’t take it, what then?”

“Then we kick you off this place in half an hour. Then we blacklist the whole damn bunch of you. You can’t go any place; you can’t get a job any place. We’ll have five hundred deputy sheriffs if we need ’em. That’s the other side. We’ll see you can’t get a job this side of hell. What’s more, we’ll jug your pals here, and see they get the limit.”

London said, “You can’t vag ’em if they’ve got money.”

The ‘super’ stepped closer, pressing his advantage. “Don’t be a fool, London. You know as well as I do what the vagrancy laws are. You know vagrancy’s anything the judge doesn’t want you to do. And if you
don’t
know it, the judge here’s named Hunter. Come on, now, London. Bring the men back to work. It’s a steady job for you, five dollars a day.”

London’s eyes fell away. He looked at Mac, asking mutely for instructions. Mac let the silence hang.

“Well, come on, London. How about it? Your red pals here can’t help you, and you know it damn well.”

Jim, on the outskirts, was shivering. His eyes were wide and quiet. Mac watched London and saw what the ‘super’ did not see, the shoulders gradually settling and widening, the big, muscled neck dropping down between the shoulders, the arms hooking slowly up, the eyes taking on a dangerous gleam, a flush stealing up the neck and out on the cheeks.

Suddenly Mac cried sharply, “London!” London jerked, and then relaxed a little. Mac said quietly, “I know a way out, London. While this gent is here, let’s hold a meetin’ of all the men. Let’s tell the guys what we’ve been offered to sell ’em out. We’ll take a vote on whether you get that five dollar job and—then—we’ll try to keep the guys from lynchin’ this gent here.”

The ‘super’ turned red with anger. “This is the last offer,” he cried. “Take this, or get out.”

“We was just about to get out,” Mac said.

“You’ll get out of the Torgas Valley. We’ll run you out.”

“Oh, no you won’t. We got a piece of private property we can stay on. The owner invited us.”

“That’s a lie!”

“Listen, mister,” Mac said, “we’re goin’ to have a little trouble gettin’ you and your bodyguard out of here as it is. Don’t make it no worse.”

“Well, where do you think you’re going to stay?”

Mac sat down on a box. His voice grew cold. “Listen, mister, we’re goin’ to camp on the Anderson place. Now the first thing you babies are goin’ to think of is gettin’ us off. That’s O.K. We’ll take our chance. The second thing you weasels are goin’ to do is try to get back at Anderson. Now I’m tellin’ you this, if any of your boys touch that
property or hurt Anderson, if you hurt one single fruit tree, a thousand guys’ll start out an’ every one of ’em ’11 have a box of matches.
Get it, mister?
Take it as a threat if you want to: you touch Anderson’s ranch and by Christ we’ll burn every fucking house and barn on every ranch in the Valley!” Tears of fury were in Mac’s eyes. His chest shuddered as though he were about to cry.

The ‘super’ snapped his head around to London. “You see the kind of men you’re mixed up with, London? You know how many years you can get for arson?”

London choked. “You better scram on, Mister. I’m goin’ to kill you if you don’t. You better go now. Make him go now, Mac,” he cried. “For Christ’s sake, make him
go!"

The ‘super’ backed away from the heavy, weaving body of London and reached behind him to find the doorknob. “Threat of murder,” he said thickly. The door was open behind him.

“You got no witness to a threat,” Mac said.

Outside the deputies tried to see in between the stiff bodies of the guardians. “You’re fools, all of you,” the ‘super’ said. “If I need ’em, I’ll have a dozen witnesses to anything I want. You’ve had my last word.”

The guardians stepped aside for the ‘super.’ The deputies ranged up beside him. Not a sound came from the bunched men. A lane opened up for the three and they strode out through it. The silent men followed them with their eyes, and the eyes were puzzled and angry. The three marched stiffly to a big roadster that stood at one end of the building. They climbed in and drove away. And then the crowd looked slowly back at the open door of London’s room. London stood leaning against the door-jamb, looking weak and sick.

Mac stepped into the doorway and put his arm around London’s shoulders. They were two feet above the heads of the quiet men. Mac cried, “Listen, you guys. We didn’t want to tell you before they got away; we was afraid you’d stomp ’em to death. That mug come here to try to get London to sell you out. London was goin’ to get a steady job, an’ you guys was goin’ to get screwed.”

A growl started, a snarling growl. Mac held up his hand. “No need to get mad, wait a minute, now. Jus’ remember it later; they tried to buy London—an’ they couldn’t. Now shut up for a minute. We got to get out o’ here. We got a ranch to stay on. There’s goin’ to be order, too. That’s the only way we can win this. We all got to take orders. Now the guys that got cars take all the women an’ kids an’ the truck that can’t be carried. The rest’ll have to walk. Now be nice. Don’t break nothing—yet. An’ stay together. While you’re gettin’ your stuff picked up, London wants to see his committee.”

The moment he stopped talking a turbulence broke out. Shouting and laughing, the men eddied. They seemed filled with a terrible joy, a bloody, lustful joy. Their laughter was heavy. Into the rooms they swarmed, and carried out their things and piled them on the ground—pots and kettles, blankets, bundles of clothing. The women rolled out push-carts for the children. Six of the committeemen forced and shouldered their way through the press, and entered London’s room.

The sun was clear of the trees now, and the air was warmed by it. Behind the buildings battered old cars began to start with bursts of noise. There were sounds of hammering as possessions were boxed. The place swam with activity, with the commotion of endless trips back and
forth, of opinions shouted, of judgments made and overruled.

London let his committee in and shut the door to keep out the noise. The men were silent, dignified, grave and important. They sat on boxes and clasped their knees and bent portentous looks at the walls.

Mac said, “London, d’you mind if I talk to them?”

“Sure, go ahead.”

“I don’t mean to hog the show, gents,” Mac continued. “I had some experience. I been through this before. Maybe I can show you where the thing breaks down, and maybe we can steer clear of some of the things that conk us.”

One of the men said, “Go ahead, fella. We’ll listen.”

“O.K. We got plenty of fire now. That’s the trouble with workin’ stiffs, though. One minute they’re steamed up like a keg of beer, and the next, they’re cold as a whore’s heart. We got to cut down the steam and warm up the cold. Now I want to make a suggestion. You guys can think it over, an’ then you can maybe get the whole bunch to vote on it. Most strikes break down because they got no discipline. Suppose we divide the men in squads, let each squad elect a leader, and then he’s responsible for his squad. We can work ’em in groups, then.”