King Coal

  King Coal

  A Novel

  Upton Sinclair

  TO

  MARY CRAIG KIMBROUGH

  To whose persistence in the perilous task of tearing her husband’s manuscript to pieces, the reader is indebted for the absence of most of the faults from this book.

  INTRODUCTION

  Upton Sinclair is one of the not too many writers who have consecrated their lives to the agitation for social justice, and who have also enrolled their art in the service of a set purpose. A great and non-temporizing enthusiast, he never flinched from making sacrifices. Now and then he attained great material successes as a writer, but invariably he invested and lost his earnings in enterprises by which he had hoped to ward off injustice and to further human happiness. Though disappointed time after time, he never lost faith nor courage to start again.

  As a convinced socialist and eager advocate of unpopular doctrines, as an exposer of social conditions that would otherwise be screened away from the public eye, the most influential journals of his country were as a rule arraigned against him. Though always a poor man, though never willing to grant to publishers the concessions essential for many editions and general popularity, he was maliciously represented to be a carpet knight of radicalism and a socialist millionaire. He has several times been obliged to change his publisher, which goes to prove that he is no seeker of material gain.

  Upton Sinclair is one of the writers of the present time most deserving of a sympathetic interest. He shows his patriotism as an American, not by joining in hymns to the very conditional kind of liberty peculiar to the United States, but by agitating for infusing it with the elixir of real liberty, the liberty of humanity. He does not limit himself to a dispassionate and entertaining description of things as they are. But in his appeals to the honour and good-fellowship of his compatriots, he opens their eyes to the appalling conditions under which wage-earning slaves are living by the hundreds of thousands. His object is to better these unnatural conditions, to obtain for the very poorest a glimpse of light and happiness, to make even them realise the sensation of cosy well-being and the comfort of knowing that justice is to be found also for them.

  This time Upton Sinclair has absorbed himself in the study of the miner’s life in the lonesome pits of the Rocky Mountains, and his sensitive and enthusiastic mind has brought to the world an American parallel to GERMINAL, Emile Zola’s technical masterpiece.

  The conditions described in the two books are, however, essentially different. While Zola’s working-men are all natives of France, one meets in Sinclair’s book a motley variety of European emigrants, speaking a Babel of languages and therefore debarred from forming some sort of association to protect themselves against being exploited by the anonymous limited Company. Notwithstanding this natural bar against united action on the part of the wage-earning slaves, the Company feels far from at ease and jealously guards its interests against any attempt of organising the men.

  A young American of the upper class, with great sympathy for the downtrodden and an honest desire to get a first-hand knowledge of their conditions in order to help them, decides to take employment in a mine under a fictitious name and dressed like a working-man. His unusual way of trying to obtain work arouses suspicion. He is believed to be a professional strike-leader sent out to organise the miners against their exploiters, and he is not only refused work, but thrashed mercilessly. When finally he succeeds in getting inside, he discovers with growing indignation the shameless and inhuman way in which those who unearth the black coal are being exploited.

  These are the fundamental ideas of the book, but they give but a faint notion of the author’s poetic attitude. Most beautifully is this shown in Hal’s relation to a young Irish girl, Red Mary. She is poor, and her daily life harsh and joyless, but nevertheless her wonderful grace is one of the outstanding features of the book. The first impression of Mary is that of a Celtic Madonna with a tender heart for little children. She develops into a Valküre of the working-class, always ready to fight for the worker’s right.

  The last chapters of the book give a description of the miners’ revolt against the Company. They insist upon their right to choose a deputy to control the weighing-in of the coal, and upon having the mines sprinkled regularly to prevent explosion. They will also be free to buy their food and utensils wherever they like, even in shops not belonging to the Company.

  In a postscript Sinclair explains the fundamental facts on which his work of art has been built up. Even without the postscript one could not help feeling convinced that the social conditions he describes are true to life. The main point is that Sinclair has not allowed himself to become inspired by hackneyed phrases that bondage and injustice and the other evils and crimes of Kingdoms have been banished from Republics, but that he is earnestly pointing to the honeycombed ground on which the greatest modern money-power has been built. The fundament of this power is not granite, but mines. It lives and breathes in the light, because it has thousands of unfortunates toiling in the darkness. It lives and has its being in proud liberty because thousands are slaving for it, whose thraldom is the price of this liberty.

  This is the impression given to the reader of this exciting novel.

  GEORG BRANDES.

  BOOK ONE — THE DOMAIN OF KING COAL

  1. The town of Pedro stood on the edge of the mountain country; a straggling assemblage of stores and saloons from which a number of branch railroads ran up into the canyons, feeding the coal-camps. Through the week it slept peacefully; but on Saturday nights, when the miners came trooping down, and the ranchmen came in on horseback and in automobiles, it wakened to a seething life.

  At the railroad station, one day late in June, a young man alighted from a train. He was about twenty-one years of age, with sensitive features, and brown hair having a tendency to waviness. He wore a frayed and faded suit of clothes, purchased in a quarter of his home city where the Hebrew merchants stand on the sidewalks to offer their wares; also a soiled blue shirt without a tie, and a pair of heavy boots which had seen much service. Strapped on his back was a change of clothing and a blanket, and in his pockets a comb, a toothbrush, and a small pocket mirror.

  Sitting in the smoking-car of the train, the young man had listened to the talk of the coal-camps, seeking to correct his accent. When he got off the train he proceeded down the track and washed his hands with cinders, and lightly powdered some over his face. After studying the effect of this in his mirror, he strolled down the main street of Pedro, and, selecting a little tobacco-shop, went in. In as surly a voice as he could muster, he inquired of the proprietress, “Can you tell me how to get to the Pine Creek mine?”

  The woman looked at him with no suspicion in her glance. She gave the desired information, and he took a trolley and got off at the foot of the Pine Creek canyon, up which he had a thirteen-mile trudge. It was a sunshiny day, with the sky crystal clear, and the mountain air invigourating. The young man seemed to be happy, and as he strode on his way, he sang a song with many verses:

  “Old King Coal was a merry old soul,

  And a merry old soul was he;

  He made him a college all full of knowledge—

  Hurrah for you and me!

  “Oh, Liza-Ann, come out with me,

  The moon is a-shinin’ in the monkey-puzzle tree;

  Oh, Liza-Ann, I have began

  To sing you the song of Harrigan!

  “He keeps them a-roll, this merry old soul—

  The wheels of industree;

  A-roll and a-roll, for his pipe and his bowl

  And his college facultee!

  “Oh, Mary-Jane, come out in the lane,

  The moon
is a-shinin’ in the old pecan;

  Oh, Mary-Jane, don’t you hear me a-sayin’

  I’ll sing you the song of Harrigan!

  “So hurrah for King Coal, and his fat pay-roll,

  And his wheels of industree!

  Hurrah for his pipe, and hurrah for his bowl—

  And hurrah for you and me!

  “Oh, Liza-Ann, come out with me,

  The moon is a-shinin’—”

  And so on and on—as long as the moon was a-shinin’ on a college campus. It was a mixture of happy nonsense and that questioning with which modern youth has begun to trouble its elders. As a marching tune, the song was a trifle swift for the grades of a mountain canyon; Warner could stop and shout to the canyon-walls, and listen to their answer, and then march on again. He had youth in his heart, and love and curiosity; also he had some change in his trousers’ pocket, and a ten dollar bill, for extreme emergencies, sewed up in his belt. If a photographer for Peter Harrigan’s General Fuel Company could have got a snap-shot of him that morning, it might have served as a “portrait of a coal-miner” in any “prosperity” publication.

  But the climb was a stiff one, and before the end the traveller became aware of the weight of his boots, and sang no more. Just as the sun was sinking up the canyon, he came upon his destination—a gate across the road, with a sign upon it:

  PINE CREEK COAL CO.

  PRIVATE PROPERTY

  TRESPASSING FORBIDDEN

  Hal approached the gate, which was of iron bars, and padlocked. After standing for a moment to get ready his surly voice, he kicked upon the gate and a man came out of a shack inside.

  “What do you want?” said he.

  “I want to get in. I’m looking for a job.”

  “Where do you come from?”

  “From Pedro.”

  “Where you been working?”

  “I never worked in a mine before.”

  “Where did you work?”

  “In a grocery-store.”

  “What grocery-store?”

  “Peterson & Co., in Western City.”

  The guard came closer to the gate and studied him through the bars.

  “Hey, Bill!” he called, and another man came out from the cabin. “Here’s a guy says he worked in a grocery, and he’s lookin’ for a job.”

  “Where’s your papers?” demanded Bill.

  Every one had told Hal that labour was scarce in the mines, and that the companies were ravenous for men; he had supposed that a workingman would only have to knock, and it would be opened unto him. “They didn’t give me no papers,” he said, and added, hastily, “I got drunk and they fired me.” He felt quite sure that getting drunk would not bar one from a coal camp.

  But the two made no move to open the gate. The second man studied him deliberately from top to toe, and Hal was uneasily aware of possible sources of suspicion. “I’m all right,” he declared. “Let me in, and I’ll show you.”

  Still the two made no move. They looked at each other, and then Bill answered, “We don’t need no hands.”

  “But,” exclaimed Hal, “I saw a sign down the canyon—”

  “That’s an old sign,” said Bill.

  “But I walked all the way up here!”

  “You’ll find it easier walkin’ back.”

  “But—it’s night!”

  “Scared of the dark, kid?” inquired Bill, facetiously.

  “Oh, say!” replied Hal. “Give a fellow a chance! Ain’t there some way I can pay for my keep—or at least for a bunk to-night?”

  “There’s nothin’ for you,” said Bill, and turned and went into the cabin.

  The other man waited and watched, with a decidedly hostile look. Hal strove to plead with him, but thrice he repeated, “Down the canyon with you.” So at last Hal gave up, and moved down the road a piece and sat down to reflect.

  It really seemed an absurdly illogical proceeding, to post a notice, “Hands Wanted,” in conspicuous places on the roadside, causing a man to climb thirteen miles up a mountain canyon, only to be turned off without explanation. Hal was convinced that there must be jobs inside the stockade, and that if only he could get at the bosses he could persuade them. He got up and walked down the road a quarter of a mile, to where the railroad-track crossed it, winding up the canyon. A train of “empties” was passing, bound into the camp, the cars rattling and bumping as the engine toiled up the grade. This suggested a solution of the difficulty.

  It was already growing dark. Crouching slightly, Hal approached the cars, and when he was in the shadows, made a leap and swung onto one of them. It took but a second to clamber in, and he lay flat and waited, his heart thumping.

  Before a minute had passed he heard a shout, and looking over, he saw the Cerberus of the gate running down a path to the track, his companion, Bill, just behind him. “Hey! come out of there!” they yelled; and Bill leaped, and caught the car in which Hal was riding.

  The latter saw that the game was up, and sprang to the ground on the other side of the track and started out of the camp. Bill followed him, and as the train passed, the other man ran down the track to join him. Hal was walking rapidly, without a word; but the Cerberus of the gate had many words, most of them unprintable, and he seized Hal by the collar, and shoving him violently, planted a kick upon that portion of his anatomy which nature has constructed for the reception of kicks. Hal recovered his balance, and, as the man was still pursuing him, he turned and aimed a blow, striking him on the chest and making him reel.

  Hal’s big brother had seen to it that he knew how to use his fists; he now squared off, prepared to receive the second of his assailants. But in coal-camps matters are not settled in that primitive way, it appeared. The man halted, and the muzzle of a revolver came suddenly under Hal’s nose. “Stick ’em up!” said the man.

  This was a slang which Hal had never heard, but the meaning was inescapable; he “stuck ’em up.” At the same moment his first assailant rushed at him, and dealt him a blow over the eye which sent him sprawling backward upon the stones.

  2. When Hal came to himself again he was in darkness, and was conscious of agony from head to toe. He was lying on a stone floor, and he rolled over, but soon rolled back again, because there was no part of his back which was not sore. Later on, when he was able to study himself, he counted over a score of marks of the heavy boots of his assailants.

  He lay for an hour or two, making up his mind that he was in a lock-up, because he could see the starlight through iron bars. He could hear somebody snoring, and he called half a dozen times, in a louder and louder voice, until at last, hearing a growl, he inquired, “Can you give me a drink of water?”

  “I’ll give you hell if you wake me up again,” said the voice; after which Hal lay in silence until morning.

  A couple of hours after daylight, a man entered his cell. “Get up,” said he, and added a prod with his foot. Hal had thought he could not do it, but he got up.

  “No funny business now,” said his jailer, and grasping him by the sleeve of his coat, marched him out of the cell and down a little corridor into a sort of office, where sat a red-faced personage with a silver shield upon the lapel of his coat. Hal’s two assailants of the night before stood nearby.

  “Well, kid?” said the personage in the chair. “Had a little time to think it over?”

  “Yes,” said Hal, briefly.

  “What’s the charge?” inquired the personage, of the two watchmen.

  “Trespassing and resisting arrest.”

  “How much money you got, young fellow?” was, the next question.

  Hal hesitated.

  “Speak up there!” said the man.

  “Two dollars and sixty-seven cents,” said Hal—“as well as I can remember.”

  “Go on!” said the other. “What you givin’ us?” And th
en, to the two watchmen, “Search him.”

  “Take off your coat and pants,” said Bill, promptly, “and your boots.”

  “Oh, I say!” protested Hal.

  “Take ’em off!” said the man, and clenched his fists. Hal took ’em off, and they proceeded to go through the pockets, producing a purse with the amount stated, also a cheap watch, a strong pocket knife, the tooth-brush, comb and mirror, and two white handkerchiefs, which they looked at contemptuously and tossed to the spittle-drenched floor.

  They unrolled the pack, and threw the clean clothing about. Then, opening the pocket-knife, they proceeded to pry about the soles and heels of the boots, and to cut open the lining of the clothing. So they found the ten dollars in the belt, which they tossed onto the table with the other belongings. Then the personage with the shield announced, “I fine you twelve dollars and sixty-seven cents, and your watch and knife.” He added, with a grin, “You can keep your snot-rags.”

  “Now see here!” said Hal, angrily. “This is pretty raw!”

  “You get your duds on, young fellow, and get out of here as quick as you can, or you’ll go in your shirt-tail.”

  But Hal was angry enough to have been willing to go in his skin. “You tell me who you are, and your authority for this procedure?”

  “I’m marshal of the camp,” said the man.

  “You mean you’re an employé of the General Fuel Company? And you propose to rob me—”

  “Put him out, Bill,” said the marshal. And Hal saw Bill’s fists clench.

  “All right,” he said, swallowing his indignation. “Wait till I get my clothes on.” And he proceeded to dress as quickly as possible; he rolled up his blanket and spare clothing, and started for the door.

  “Remember,” said the marshal, “straight down the canyon with you, and if you show your face round here again, you’ll get a bullet through you.”

  So Hal went out into the sunshine, with a guard on each side of him as an escort. He was on the same mountain road, but in the midst of the company-village. In the distance he saw the great building of the breaker, and heard the incessant roar of machinery and falling coal. He marched past a double lane of company houses and shanties, where slattern women in doorways and dirty children digging in the dust of the roadside paused and grinned at him—for he limped as he walked, and it was evident enough what had happened to him.