The Coal War (43 page)

Then suddenly Hal heard a familiar voice. “What are you doing, you fellows? Drop that, and go about your business!”

Hal clambered out of the hole, and confronted his cousin; and for a minute the two stood staring into each other's eyes. “Well, Appie!” said Hal, at last. “How do you like this?”

When the other spoke, there was no life in his voice. “I couldn't stop it,” he said. “I've done everything in my power.”

“They're not taking your orders to-night, hey?”

“They're not, indeed,” the Captain answered. “As God is my witness, I had nothing to say.”

“Do you know they've murdered Louie the Greek? And John Edstrom, and Kowalewsky, the Pole? Shot them down in cold blood!”

The other stared at him. “No, I didn't know it.”

“And look at these tents! There were women and children in the cellars! There may be women and children in them still!” Hal thought suddenly of all the places into which he had helped to crowd people. He thought of Rosa Minetti and her three babies; of Mrs. Zamboni and her eight. “Come help me!” he cried. “We may save some yet!”

Captain Harding hesitated for a moment, then took Hal by the shoulder. “You mustn't stay here!” he said. “They'll do something to you if they see you.”

“What do I care?” cried Hal. “There are women and children under those burning tents!”

But the other held him by force. “You must get out of here!”

“Damn you!” cried Hal. “You stood for this! You let it happen! And now you want me to be a coward too!”

“Old man,” replied the other, “you're out of your head. You must go away from here.”

And there in the light of the burning tents, the two came near to having a fight. The matter was ended by Captain Harding calling two of his troopers. They took Hal by the arms, and with the officer arguing and commanding, they forced him away from the tent-colony.

When they were out in the darkness, Appie was able to get him to listen to reason. If only he would promise to go away, Appie would return with his men, and do all he could to save the people in the cellars. The militiamen would obey his orders, provided they were not made furious by the sight of Hal. So finally the young man promised, and started away across the plain.

He found himself near the railroad, and suddenly remembered the well in which so many people had sought refuge. He turned towards it; but before he got near he heard bullets whistling past, and realized that he had come into the danger-zone once more. There was still enough light for his figure to be shot at, and so he began to run, and reached the well and called. The people were still inside, upon the rickety platforms and steps.

At the top was Mrs. David, who had taken the throng in hand. While she and Hal were discussing what to do, a freight-train approached, and stopped at the water-tank. The militiamen who were doing the firing were posted on a ridge on the other side of the track, and Hal realized in a flash that this train had cut them off. “Now's the time to get out!” he cried; and the others took up the cry, and the crowd began to pour out of the well.

A couple of hundred yards down the track was an arroyo. If once they could make that point, they were safe. But before they had got half way, the militiamen had found out what was happening, and several of them rushed towards the engine and leaped upon the running-board, leveling their rifles at the head of the driver. They forced him to stop watering his engine and to move his train out of the way; after which a fusillade of bullets poured after the fleeing crowd. Mrs. David, carrying one of her children and dragging the other, found afterwards that she had got a shot through the sleeve of her coat, and another through her skirt. Several of the children were shot.

But the crowd got to the arroyo, and crouched in the shadows, or made their way along, stumbling over rocks and irregularities in the darkness. Some of them traveled for miles in this way. One woman gave birth to a baby during the flight, and was out in the cold and rain unassisted for forty-eight hours. Others came to a ranch, where they were given food and shelter; and next day the militiamen visited this ranch, and completely gutted the house, leaving a note tacked upon the door explaining that this was what happened to those who gave encouragement to “red-necks”!

[28]

Late that evening Hal came into the town of Pedro. The streets were swarming with excited men and women; anyone who had news from Horton was instantly surrounded by a throng. One heard the most hideous tales that night, so that one did not know what to believe. Strikers had been shot, some of them beaten to death, their bodies thrown into the burning cellars; there were witnesses ready to swear that they had seen militiamen using their bayonets to drive people back into the flames. The estimates of the dead ran from twenty-five to a hundred—and there was no way to find out the truth.

Hal went to the union headquarters, where he met Billy Keating, almost beside himself with excitement, the perspiration standing out in beads on his forehead, making streaks down his full-moon face. He had been over to Horton, and had tried to get through the cordon which the militia had thrown about the colony; they had threatened him with arrest, and driven him away, and now he was through with the job of reporter. “It's a gun for me!” he exclaimed; and he asked Hal, “Have you had enough yet?”

“Yes,” was the answer, “I've had enough.” Hal had had it out with himself during his flight down the arroyo. He was done with talk, with fine sentiments!

That was the mood of nine people out of ten in Pedro, he found. Store-keepers, cab-drivers, bar-tenders—even doctors and lawyers—they were asking for guns. And Johann Hartman was ready for them; he invited Hal and Billy and a party of a dozen others to a blacksmith's shop on the outskirts of the town, and in a shed in back of the shop he disclosed some packing-cases. The covers were knocked off, and there, each neatly wrapped in excelsior and paper, were beautiful new shiny army-rifles. In other cases were full cartridge belts, all ready to be strapped on. A fine and satisfactory thing was “preparedness”, when you really came to need it!

That group marched forth, and other groups came. It was rainy and cold and dark, but no one delayed on that account; some of them set out to march on foot, others started in automobiles. And the same thing was happening in all the towns and villages of this coal-country—the roads were thronged with parties of men marching towards the scene of the “massacre”. You were amazed when you heard the roll-call of these parties; they were not merely striking workingmen, but prosperous bankers and merchants of these company-ridden towns!

Hal and Billy and their party left the automobile on the outskirts of Horton, for they did not want to take any chance of being ambushed or captured by militiamen. But their entry into the town was unmolested, the enemy having thought discretion the better part of valor, and retired beyond the tent-colony. In the village one heard new stories of horrors; the members of “Troop E” seemed to have gone quite insane with fury—they had spent the night burning and smashing everything in the colony.

At the railroad-station, which had been turned into an emergency hospital, Hal met Mary Burke, still at her duties. She came to him, her face like a mask of grief. “Have ye heard the news, Joe?—who's dead?”

And she stood with her two hands clasped together, staring at him. “The Minetti children.”

“Oh, my God!” he cried.

“All three of them! And Rosa—she may live, they say, but we can't find out for sure.”

“What happened?”

“They were in one of the cellars. They were suffocated—some of them burned. And Mrs. Bojanic and her children, and Mrs. Alvarez and hers—all in one cellar.”

“But those people weren't in the Minetti cellar!” exclaimed Hal.

“It wasn't the Minetti cellar, Joe. It was Tent Fifty-eight—the maternity-tent.”

“But Rosa and her children weren't there!”

“They were, Joe. They were found in it.”

“But I put them in their own tent—with Mrs. Ramirez and—”

“I don't know about that, Joe; but they were taken from under the maternity-tent.” And Mary named three Italian women who had been near, and had brought the information. “There's no doubt about it. They were burned, but not too much to be recognized.”

Hal turned away to hide his emotion. Little Jerry, his play-mate and pal, and Maria, who had been the baby when he had boarded with the Minettis at North Valley, and Gino, the new baby, the pretty little black-eyed Dago doll—burned, but not too much to be recognized! It seemed to Hal that he could still feel Little Jerry kicking and struggling in his arms. “I kill them militias!”

Long afterwards Hal solved the mystery of the Minetti family's presence in the maternity-tent. Rosa, who survived, a distracted and desolate wreck, told the story of that night of horror. Her own tent having been set fire to, she climbed out of the cellar with the children; but then, bewildered by the flames and smoke, the shooting and the yells of the militiamen, she sought another place to hide. She thought of the maternity-tent, which had a big roomy cellar, floored and timbered and fitted with a bed, upon which the babies of the colony had been born. She fled into this, and when the tent and platform above were fired, she and the other women and children covered their heads with blankets and hid from the smoke. They became unconscious, and when the place was opened up, it was found that eleven children were dead, and two women, both of them about to become mothers.

“Where's Big Jerry?” asked Hal.

“I don't know,” said Mary. “Out fighting, I guess.”

“Does he know yet?”

“I don't know that.”

“And where are the bodies?”

Mary answered that the militia had them. They would not let anyone come near the colony. They had sent out for wagon-loads of quick-lime, it was reported; no doubt they wanted to destroy the bodies, so that no one would ever know how many had been killed.

Hal gripped his gun, in sudden fury, and turned to the rest of the party. “Come on, boys,” he said. “It's coming on daylight, and we have work to do!”

[29]

In the darkness and rain they marched up into the hills, where the strikers had sought refuge. When they were challenged, they answered, “Friends,” and the strikers crowded about to welcome them. Hal questioned them—who was with them and what arms they had, who was wounded, who dead. He told them the news from the tent-colony, and there were cries of rage. There could be no doubt about the mood of these men; they were ready for real war. And Hal was ready too. For seven months he had been watching and enduring—spending all his energies in enduring. It had been a heavier strain than he had realized; and now suddenly his energies were released—now he would have decision, action!

It was daylight, and he looked about. The strikers had dug themselves a regular line of entrenchments; but this did not appeal to his mood. “Boys,” he cried, “we don't want to stay hiding out here in the rain! We want to punish them, don't we?”

They answered with a yell; yes, that was what they wanted!

“You fellows that have real guns and know how to shoot! Where are these Greeks and Montynegroes that were in the war?”

So they crowded around him. They would do whatever he said, they would follow him to the death. He should have led them long ago!

Hal picked out the men who could be relied upon, dividing them into two companies, to be commanded by Billy Keating and himself. Billy had borrowed a pair of opera-glasses, and from the top of the ridge they looked over the position and mapped out their plan of campaign. They would move forward in open order, finding shelter where they could, and advancing at regular intervals, spreading out on both sides and taking the militia in the railroad-cut on the flank. “And keep moving, boys, we're none of us going to stop! And remember, don't shoot too often. The noise won't frighten them—we must hit something!”

So they started in; and very soon the militiamen realized that their foes meant business now. They beat a hasty retreat—all but one, who was hiding behind a big rock, shooting deliberately and carefully. Hal marked this man's position, and behind a rock he lay down to watch.

Hal Warner was no wage-slave, who had spent his life digging coal; he was a member of the privileged classes, and one of his privileges had been the use of a rifle. He had hunted mountain-goats in Mexico, an occupation which requires endurance, patience and keen eyesight. So he watched, and when the militiaman raised up to fire again, he fired first, and the militiaman disappeared.

Hal poked up his hat on the end of his gun, and moved it about for a while, but there came no response. So at last he sprang up and rushed the place. There, flat on his face, lay his human target, wth a clot of blood in his hair where the bullet had come out. Hal looked at him, and the realization came over him with a wave of horror, so that he went sick, and had to lean on his rifle. He had killed a man!

It was a big fellow, six feet high, with beefy legs and beefy shoulders, which would never move again. Hal took in every aspect of him—the khaki uniform, soaked with rain and stained with red clay, the red stained puttees and boots. He had learned to hate this militia uniform with such bitterness that he trembled when he saw it; but he did not hate it at that moment. He turned the man over, and saw his weather-beaten face, looking dull and placid, as if he had not had time to get interested in what was happening. The bullet had drilled a clean little hole through the middle of his forehead.

And so this was what Hal had come to! He who had started out with a dream of brotherhood and justice upon earth—here he was, a murderer!

Voices within him cried out in protest. But he did not have time to listen to them. A bullet went by him, singing loud and shrill, like a telephone wire in a wind. A second later came another, and he felt a pain as if a bee had stung him on the top of his head. He took off his hat, and looked, and saw there was a hole in the band. He realized that this was no time for philosophy or ethics, and dropped behind a big rock.