by S. L. Stoner
“Now there’s a good question.” Merrill’s eyes glinted with merriment. “Might be worth your while to determine which councilmen recommended our city engineer for his position. There’s rumors about that the engineer did not inspect that new sewer pipe laid in the Guild’s Lake area up north of the city. It’s already leaking like a sieve. Phewee—I can tell you that sure doesn’t make the neighbors’ noses happy. Maybe he used the same blind eye when he inspected work on the elevated roadways. He’s always struck me as a lazy, self-important old boy. Yet, certain council members won’t hear a word against him. I know, I’ve tried.” With that Merrill stood, clapping a hat onto his thick gray hair, saying, “Well, fellas, I’ve stocked some bicycles that need selling, so I best return to work.”
Sage and Johnston also stood and thanked Merrill for his time. As he shook their hands, Merrill said, “The thanks I want, Adair, is proof that Mackey and that nasty piece of work he calls his son are dirty with graft. Between me squawking at council and Ben here lambasting them in his newspaper, we might be able to send some of their horses back to the stables for good. That’d be loads of fun,” he said, leaving them with an exaggerated wink.
SEVEN
Inside Mozart’s kitchen, the staff bustled about preparing for the dinner hour. Sage thought his mother absent until a burst of laughter sounded outside the kitchen door. He looked out the kitchen door window and saw his mother and Fong standing in the alley talking with that ragpicker, Herman Eich. The talk stopped the moment Sage opened the door and stepped onto the small porch.
“So, ah, how is everybody?” Sage asked, his question sounding stilted to his ears.
After a hesitation, his mother spoke,“We are fine, Mr. Adair. Just having a few words with Mr. Eich here. We’ll be in shortly.”
Right. She was doing exactly as she was supposed to around a stranger—carrying on with the pretense of their being merely employer and employee. So Sage said, “That’s quite fine, Mrs. Clemens. There’s still some time before dinner starts.” He felt rooted to the porch floor, having nothing to say, yet reluctant to leave without knowing why.
Mae Clemens and Fong KamTong, however, merely smiled at him politely, which left him with no choice. His need to flee the awkwardness of the situation won out. Sage reentered the kitchen, closing the door softly behind him. Through its glass, he heard Eich’s low rumble and they laughed again. Sage felt a nip of irritation, only to regret it immediately. “Feeling a bit excluded are we?” he chided himself. “Can’t be in the center of things all of the time, fella.” He poured himself a cup of coffee, opened the day’s Journal and waited for the alley conversation to end.
s s s
The dinner hour concluded and the patrons sent on their way, Sage and Fong climbed the stairs to face each other in the attic, preparing to train in a fighting style that Fong called the “snake and crane.” Weak sunlight filtering down through the rooftop skylight, onto the space’s lacquered wood floors and whitewashed walls. With an intense yet distant gaze, Fong stepped one foot forward and raised his right arm across his chest. In response, Sage raised his right arm until their wrists touched, back to back and push hands began.
Many moves later, muscles wobbly and body sweat-drenched, Sage called a halt. Any more and he might upchuck. While Sage paced to cool down, Fong began a round of movements he called “temple exercises,” starting with the gentle rocking movement of the “prayer wheel.”
Once his heartbeat slowed to normal, Sage ventured a question, keeping his voice soft to fit the peacefulness of the attic. “So what are your thoughts about him, Mr. Fong?”
“Who is that, Mr. Sage?” Fong’s flowing movements didn’t pause in their expression of elegant, focused power.
“That ragpicker, Mr. Eich.”
“I think he is a most interesting man,” Fong answered, his breath steady. Fong often found people “interesting.” It made him seem like a friendly Asian anthropologist meticulously studying the peculiarities of the European-based cultures.
“And just how is it that you find this Eich person interesting?” Sage asked.
“Well, for one thing, Mr. Eich say he admires Chinese because we are different from Americans because we honor wilderness and not fear it. After thinking on this observation, I believe he is correct. I never notice difference before he say it.”
Insight fizzed briefly in Sage’s mind like a newly-opened sarsaparilla. Come to think of it, that children’s story about Hansel and Gretel was all about being afraid in the woods. Fact of the matter, the first few times Sage was alone when night crept beneath the towering evergreens, he’d even thought of that fairy tale. Later, when he came to know the forest better, he’d become no more than reasonably afraid of its actual dangers—falling limbs, bears, cougars, wolves, sasquatches, and the stray crazy man or two.
Sage sighed, saying, “Great. Another one of you is on the loose.”
“What does that mean, ‘another one’ of me?”
“You know, fond of those little sayings that roll about in the head like a ball of string with no end to catch hold of.”
“No string in my head,” Fong said before bending to “grind corn,” his hands moving in flat circles about a foot above the floor.
s s s
Over late afternoon coffee in his third floor room, Sage told Mae and Fong what Merrill had said about the city’s letting of bridge contracts. “If Chester is right and the bridges are in bad condition, we might be able to use that to bring a little suffering to the Mackeys,” he said.
Mae protested, “Surely, Sage, it is much more important to make sure no more bridges fall down than to make another human being suffer.”
“Yah, yah. Tell that to Rufus’s wife,” Sage started to say as he lifted a hand to wave her words away only to catch himself just in time. It was dangerous to denigrate Mae Clemen’s opinions. First, because she usually made good points and, second, it made her madder than a poked hornet.
Clearing his throat he said instead, “It’s just that I am so damned angry. Why is it that the rich always escape the consequences of their immoral acts? Mackey squeezes his workers out of decent pay and hours, he squeezes the city taxpayer by doing shoddy jobs, and now it looks like his greed has even squeezed the life out of innocent people like Rufus, as well as that poor mother and child who died in that house fire.”
Mae Clemens was nodding as he spoke. “Yes, Mr. Eich talked to us about that fire today,” she said.
“Really? What did he say about it?”
“Turns out, he stays beside the Markham ravine. He saw that awful fire. When he tried to go help he couldn’t get across the wrecked bridge. He says that poor woman’s husband has gone right out of his mind. Mr. Eich is worried about him. We talked some about what to do for him.”
Sage raised an admonishing palm, “Please, no more projects. We’re up to our ears in problems already. If we take on one more thing, I think my head will explode just trying to sort it all out. Let Mr. Eich handle the problem of the widower by himself. You are right. Figuring out how to prevent more trestle bridge collapses will be our contribution to easing that man’s sorrow and saving lives. Imagine what will happen in this city if all the bridges start falling down. If we can prevent that, we must. We also need to stop this strike from petering out. The way it’s going, the effort is staggering around on its last leg. I don’t relish telling St. Alban that we’ve failed—not when there’s so much at stake.”
Mae Clemens stood. “Sometimes, Sage, we’re not always the ones picking out what lands up on our plate,” she commented mildly as she headed off to start supper preparations. Once the sound of her footsteps faded away, Fong returned to Mae’s earlier point. “Your lady mother is right. Hatred destroys man who hates. ‘No evil is equal to hate, no virtue is greater than compassion!’”
“Your Mr. Lao again? That is easier to say than it is to practice.” “Just old Buddhist saying. Yes, you make good point. It
is true, some days, it is ha
rd to feel what words mean,” Fong said quietly before falling silent. The air thickened with their shared memory of a few months back when hate gripped Fong’s thoughts to the exclusion of everything else, even his friendship with Sage and their work for St. Alban.
Shaking his head free of those sidetracking thoughts, Sage asked, “So what is the solution here? Is there a way to rescue this strike? By all that is supposed to be just in this world, these men do not deserve to lose their fight against the Mackeys.”
Fong’s eyes took on a faraway look, signaling that yet another dose of Oriental wisdom was in the offing. Sage readied himself for the mental challenge.
Sure enough, Fong drew a deep breath and launched into a story.“Lao Tzu see man digging valley through mountain. When he ask man why he undertake such hard task, man say he want to make it easier for visitors to reach house.”
“And, of course, the estimable Mr. Lao set the man straight?”
Fong nodded. “Lao Tzu tell him it better to move house than the mountain.”
Sage laughed. “And what was Mr. Lao’s point, other than that the man was an idiot?”
“His point,” Fong said, “is sometimes when you face problem, it better to reject obvious solution and look for simplest.”
Sage said nothing because he was intent on catching hold of the will-o-wisp of an idea that flitted through his thoughts. It vanished, though, before he captured it. So, his attention returned to Fong’s last words. Maybe that Lao fellow was right. Were they missing a simple solution to the strike deadlock? At times like this, he silently reminded himself, waiting is the best approach. Somewhere deep within the recesses of his mind, a solution was likely fermenting. Eventually it would surface, complete and exactly right. The wait-and-see technique had worked so often for him in the past that he’d come to rely on it.
s s s
Despite a determination to push it aside, Fong’s mountain-moving story niggled at Sage as he headed toward the strike line. He strode along secure in his disguise, knowing that to passersby he looked like a poor working man in his sensible if tattered clothes, trudging through the day. Nothing about him hinted that he owned and operated one of the city’s finest restaurants or, stranger still, that he was strolling along, preoccupied with the trying to understand the cryptic sayings of his ostensible Chinese manservant. Sage snorted at the absurdity of the situation, only to notice that his noise attracted a few bemused looks from those around him.
He made an effort to return to the present by studying the faces of the people he passed. Once he engaged in that exercise, it was irrefutable that each one of their faces was unique. He felt a dash of shame for his arrogant assumptions. Who knew, really, where they originally came from? What equally unique ideas occupied their thoughts or directed their steps?
Sage’s speculations ceased when he reached the muddy road leading down to the strike line. Although more men than usual picketed before the construction shack, the brusqueness of their gestures, the shaking of their heads and the tightness in their faces telegraphed that something bad had occurred. In a quiet voice, one of the strikers told him that Rufus had died in the early morning hours.
Emotion swirled through the air, passing between men like electric arcs off one of those Tesla coils. For once, Earl Mackey wasn’t smirking from behind the window glass. Instead, a drawn curtain covered that window and Mackey was nowhere in sight. The newcomer, O’Reilly, was orating from atop Leo’s soap-box. Although Leo often allowed men to sound off from atop his box, the union president’s wrinkled brow suggested he’d just as soon O’Reilly shut up. Sage sidled up to him.
“What’s the new man talking about?” Sage asked Leo, nodding in O’Reilly’s direction.
“I’m not too sure,” Leo replied, the worry crease in his forehead deepening. “That O’Reilly, he’s talking up violence and the men are already hopping mad. You heard about Rufus dying?”
“Yah, just now.” Leo was right. The wet air sizzled with fury. “If the men jump the gun and act stupid, they’ll hurt their own cause. Public anger over Rufus’s death will turn against us,” Sage said.
“Yup. That’s exactly what I’m thinking,” Leo agreed. “There’s a few hotheads that are always a chore to hold back. Now that O’Reilly’s stirring them up even more. I better cut him off.” Leo moved from Sage’s side and began elbowing his way to the center of the group. He placed his foot atop the soapbox.
This action halted O’Reilly’s rant, since courtesy required that the newcomer make way for the union president.
Leo mounted the box and raised his voice so that it carried as far as the construction shack’s veranda where Earl Mackey now stood, arms folded across his chest. Leo turned his back on his boss and began speaking low and slow to those gathered around him, “Men, I promise you that the Mackeys will receive their comeuppance, and soon. Until then, we cannot give in to anger because it just plays into their hands. This morning we need to hold thoughts of our brother Rufus and his sacrifice foremost in our hearts. Rufus lived life as a good man. He deserves our prayers and thoughts today. He always found the funny in a bad situation and kindness in everyone. Even in the Mackeys. Remember how he’d always talk about when old man Mackey gave Rufus’s family that Christmas turkey and all the fixings when Rufus’s daughter took sick?”
The men murmured in agreement and some smiled. Leo continued, “We’ll all miss Rufus. A bright, sweet light has departed our world. Let’s each of us take a moment to pray for Rufus and his family.” Leo lowered his head and the others lowered theirs. Sage snicked a look toward O’Reilly and watched the other man’s face change from mulish to somber before he too bowed his head. Yet, despite O’Reilly’s outward compliance, Sage thought he’d glimpsed glittering in the other man’s eyes.
The squeak and squish of trundling wagon wheels interrupted Sage’s contemplation of the stranger. Huge Belgian draft horses were hauling a plank-sided wagon around the corner and down the muddy road toward them. A dozen or so rough dressed men filled the wagon bed. Although they appeared to be unarmed as they peered out from between the side slats, their faces showed a battlefield mix of fear and defiance.
“Strikebreakers,” a voice next to Sage growled and the man spat into the mud before adding, “Scabbing strikebreakers.”
The strikers began jeering, their voices hoarse with the cold and emotion, as the horses clomped past and into the lumber mill yard. Once the wagon was safely inside the gate, the strikebreakers dismounted. This was the signal for Mackey’s scrawny-necked clerk to throw open the construction shack door. He wore bowler hat and minced his way onto the veranda between two burly bodyguards. The clerk moved to a small table and wooden chair on the covered porch, picked up his pencil and gestured for the men from the wagon to line up before him.
“Sign up right here, men,” he shouted even as the quaver in his voice undercut his attempted bravado. “There’s work for each of you, provided you’ll accept $4 a day for a ten-hour day, six-day workweek,” he declared in an unnecessarily loud voice. As the men shuffled into line, the clerk cast nervous looks over his shoulder toward the striking men.
“Yah, you tell ’em, you cowardly runt. You tell those scabs to go right ahead and take the food off my family’s table! I hope you choke on it, you sons of bitches!” yelled O’Reilly, his shouted words spurring others into raising their voices.
“You fools. You’ll be working three weeks a month just to keep a roof over your head. You’ll never feed and house your family on the remaining ten dollars a month!” shouted one of the strikers.
“I sure the hell can’t feed them on no money at all—like I’m trying to now. I take this job, they’re going to eat something besides bread and milk for a change!” shouted back one of the braver scabs.
“Fine looking crew, Mackey!” shouted another striker, “What North End saloon floor did you scrape them off of? You sure they know the difference between a hammer and a mallet?”
As the din increased, Sage onc
e again studied O’Reilly. He was pretty sure that O’Reilly had no family near to hand and everyone knew he’d never worked for Mackey. This strike wasn’t O’Reilly’s fight. Yet, he seemed intent on inserting himself right into the thick of things.
The police, who’d taken up post halfway up the mud road ever since the day of their conspicuous absence, started shuffling toward the strikers, batons raised across their chests. At this sight, the strikers’ shouts quieted to angry mutters.
Shooting a worried glance in Sage’s direction, Leo stepped up onto the soapbox, calling out, “Can’t you see Mackey’s trying to goad you into rash action? Don’t give him the satisfaction. Don’t let him divert our attention away from the loss of our brother, Rufus.” Leo lowered his voice and told them, “As I started to say, before that despicable interruption, Rufus’s widow asked that we all stop by their home today. She’s grateful for all the food and comfort your wives have given her. She wants to thank everyone personally before she packs up their house. Right after tomorrow’s funeral, she and the kids are heading back East to live with her kinfolk.”