by A. J. Cronin
A loud yell went up from the mob. Inflamed by Reedy’s words they pressed round him as he ran down the steps, escorted him in a body down the street. Some, terrified, melted back towards the Terraces. But at least a hundred men joined up with Jack. They all began to move to the Neptune pit, exactly as the crowd had moved towards Ramage’s shop over twenty years before. But there were more men in the movement, a great many more. The pit was a greater attraction than Ramage’s shop. The pit was the focus, the centre wherein the sound and the fury of their souls were concentrated. The pit was the arena, the amphitheatre. Life and death and work and wages and sweat and blood were mingled in the black dust of that arena, that dark amphitheatre.
The men poured into the pit yard with Jack Reedy leading them. The pit yard was silent and the offices were closed and the shaft gaped empty like the entrance to a great empty tomb. There was no person underground, no night shift now, not a soul inbye. Even the pit bank seemed deserted, though the safety men were there, the pump-men. The two pump-men were in the engine house behind the locker room; their names were Joe Davis and Hugh Galton. The crowd streamed towards the engine house where Davis and Galton were, and Galton heard them coming first. One of the windows of the engine house was half open to let out the heat and the hot smell of oil, and Galton, an oldish man with a short grey beard, popped his head through the window.
The crowd were around the engine house now, a crowd of one hundred men, their faces all upturned to Galton in the high window of the engine house.
“What is it?” Galton called down.
With his face upturned Jack Reedy said:
“Come out here. We want you out here.”
“What for?” Galton said.
Jack repeated in a deadly tone:
“Come out here. Come out and you’ll not get hurt.”
In answer Galton drew his head back and banged down the window shut. There was a pause of about ten seconds filled by the slow thumping of the pumping engines, then Cha Leeming let out a yell and threw a brick. The window shivered, and the sound of shivering glass came above the thumping and thudding of the pumping engines. That did it. Jack Reedy ran up the steps of the engine house and Leeming and a dozen others ran after him. They burst through the door of the engine house.
The engine house was very hot and bright and full of oily heat and vibrating noise.
“What the hell,” Joe Davis said. He was a man of forty in blue dungarees with his sleeves rolled up and a coil of waste wrapped round his neck. He had been cleaning brasses with bath brick and a tin of paraffin.
Jack Reedy looked at Joe Davis from under the peak of his cap. He said rapidly:
“We don’t mean you no harm, none of the two of you. We only want you out. Out, see.”
“I’ll be damned,” Joe Davis said.
Jack came a step forward. He said, carefully watching Joe Davis:
“You’ll get out, see; the men want you out.”
“What men?” Joe Davis said.
Then Jack rushed at Joe Davis and caught him round the waist. They caught each other round the waist and wrestled like that. They wrestled and struggled for a minute with everybody looking on, and as they wrestled they knocked over the tin of paraffin. It was a big tin of paraffin and it ran out over the grating and poured into the box of cleaning rags; Slattery was the only one who saw the paraffin pour into the waste rags, they were all watching the fight, and with a kind of reflex Slattery took the cigarette end out his mouth and flicked it at the waste rags. The lighted cigarette end fell right in the middle of the box of waste rags. No one but Slattery saw it fall, for at that moment Davis slipped and went down with Jack on the top of him. The crowd rushed forward. They got hold of Davis, then rushed at Galton, and bundled them out of the engine house.
After that it all happened quickly. No one did it. They all did it, throwing loose tools, spanners and common rods, a heavy sledge, even the can of bath brick, into the mesh of slow, gleaming pistons. The sledge actually caused the damage. The sledge hit the crosshead, danced off and fell upon the main cylinder, cracked the main cylinder, then fell smash into the bearings. There was a horrible grinding and a hiss of steam. The smooth machinery twisted and shivered and locked itself abominably. The whole engine house shuddered to its foundation and was still.
Then Slattery shouted as if he had made a great discovery:
“It’s on fire. Jesus Christ! Look! It’s on fire there.”
They looked at the waste box from which flames were leaping and they looked at the still dead engines of the pumps. Then they made for the door. They squeezed through the door in a kind of panic. Jack Reedy stayed behind. Jack always was resourceful. He walked over to the oil drum and turned on the spigot. For a minute he watched the oil flow darkly. His gaze was pale and cold and bitterly triumphant. He had done something, done something. He walked quickly out and slammed the door.
Outside they stood packed in the yard. There were no flames at first, only thick coils of smoke, but soon the flames sprang, great tongues of flame.
They retreated a little before the flames which lit their upturned faces in the dark amphitheatre of the pit bank. Wafts of heat reached towards them through the coldness of the night. Then, as the flames sprang towards the power-house roof the slates began to pop. It was amazing how the slates popped. They popped off the roof like peas bouncing from a drum, one, two, three, a perfect hail of slates came pelting down, each making a lovely blazing curve, then crashing on the concrete yard.
The crowd retreated further, pressing back against the walls of the offices, back through the yard gates, back into Cowpen Street. They released Galton and Joe Davis. It was all right, all right now. Galton ran into the main office, ran to the telephone. They let him go. It was all right, all right now; another fusillade of slates came down and the lamp-room was alight and crackling. Galton began to telephone furiously. He telephoned Arthur, Armstrong and the fire-station. He telephoned the Lodge offices in Tynecastle. He left word at the Exchange to inform everyone in the district who might be of service in the emergency. Then he sprinted out of the office to do what he could do. As he came through the door into the yard a red-hot slate whizzed past his skull and missed splitting it by inches. The slate shattered on the office floor and the fragments scattered joyfully. One sizzled straight into the wastepaper basket. That set the offices on fire.
Everything was happening very fast. More men were entering the pit yard, Forbes the deputy, Harry Ogle, some of the officials and older colliers. Then the police came, Roddam, the sergeant, and a dozen men at the double. Galton joined the police, the deputy and the officials and ran with them to the safety room where Joe Davis had already uncoiled the hoses. They led the hoses out and coupled them to the hydrant, then Davis threw on the pressure. The hoses jerked and kicked and spouted water from a dozen slits. Someone had gashed the hoses. They were useless.
Arthur and Armstrong arrived simultaneously. Arthur had been reading in his room when Galton telephoned, Armstrong on the point of going to bed. They dashed up to the knot of men outside the safety room. While the leaping flames cast light and shadow across them they stood for a moment in rapid consultation, then Arthur rushed over to the offices to telephone. He found the offices on fire.
The Sleescale fire engine arrived at last and Camhow coupled up the hose line. A thin jet of water went hissing into the flames. Another hose was coupled and a second jet went up. But the jets were thin and feeble. And these two hoses were the only hoses that they had.
Things were happening faster now and there was more confusion. Men darted about the yard with their heads ducked down. Beams were falling and red-hot bricks. The flames ate everything, wood, rubble, stone and metal; the flames consumed them. Loud reports went off from time to time and the sound went booming through the town like gunfire from the sea. Cowpen Street was solid with the people, all watching, watching.
Half of the bank was razed when Heddon reached the pit. He raced from the station in the d
ay-bright glare, fighting his way forward through the crowds. As he struggled to reach the yard two fire engines from Amalgamated Collieries came clanging down the street. He swung himself up on the tail of the last engine. He entered the Neptune yard.
The power house was gone now, the safety room, lamp room and pumping station. The wind, a freshening forced draught, was fanning the blaze under the broken gables of the offices. The heat was torrid.
Heddon threw off his coat and joined with the firemen from Amalgamated. Hose after hose sent its powerful stream hoisting upon the flaming bank: steam boiled amongst the smoke and raised a pall that hung and drifted sluggishly. Ladders went scaling up. Men ran, climbed, hacked and sweated. And the night passed.
When the dawn broke there was no fire, only a smouldering. The grey cold light of the morning showed that; and all the desolation of the wreckage.
Arthur, supporting himself against a ladder, gazed upon the wrecked pit-surface. A sigh broke from his chest. He knew there was worse below. Suddenly he heard someone shouting. It was Heddon.
“Here, Armstrong,” Heddon shouted. “You’ll need to rig new pumps quick.”
Armstrong looked at Heddon and walked on. He walked up to the charred headstocks where Arthur stood beside the empty cage. In a cracked voice Armstrong said:
“We’d better see about new pumping gear. We’d better ring Tynecastle immediately if it’s to be any use.”
Arthur raised his head slowly. His brow was blacked, his eyes inflamed by smoke, his whole face empty.
“For God’s sake,” he whispered. “For God’s sake let me be.”
SIXTEEN
Despite the new and spirited memoranda in his diary beginning Further defence of Neptune Schedule P, and some complex figures multiplied determinedly in the margins of Robert Elsmere, Richard could not wholly understand. Every day at the hour of noon he struggled down to the foot of the lawn past the bare laburnum tree and balanced himself against the clean white gate of the paddock. This viewpoint, from which he could just see, and no more, the tops of the Neptune headstocks, he had named Observation Post No. 1. Strange, very strange: no signs of activity about the headstocks, neither steam nor smoke visible. Were the wheels spinning, the wheels of the winding headgear? Impossible to tell, even when the ringed eyes were shielded by both tremulous hands, telescope fashion, as befitted Observation Post No. 1. Strange, oh, very strange.
On this early January day he returned from Observation Post No. 1 with an air both baffled and triumphant: dimly aware that there was trouble, the trouble he had predicted. He was, indeed, triumphant solely because he had predicted trouble. They would call him in soon, presently, immediately!—to correct the trouble. They!
But for all his triumph he looked a shaky and ill old man. He walked very badly, even Aunt Carrie admitted that there was not much improvement with poor Richard lately, and as he came back across the lawn he staggered and almost fell. His walk was like a stuttering speech, made up of little runs and halts, a quick rush of steps, quicker and quicker, until suddenly the steps tripped themselves up and there was a stagger, then the steps had to wait and start again as though fumbling for the right syllable. But in spite of every difficulty Richard would take his walk alone, refusing Aunt Carrie’s arm with abruptness and even suspicion. It was quite natural; the man was interfered with, watched and threatened. He had his own interests to safeguard. A man must look after himself.
Having crossed the lawn he avoided Aunt Carrie’s sad and tender eye as she stood awaiting him by the portico and stuttered and stammered his way round to the French window of the drawing-room. He let himself in by the French window, lifting his feet with great care over the narrow bottom ledge. He went into the smoking-room and composed himself in a chair to write. His way of composing himself was to adjust himself accurately with his back to the chair and then allow himself to fall.
He wrote shakily: Memorandum from Observation Post No. 1 12.15×3.14. No smoke again to-day, a bad sign. The chief offender has not appeared but am convinced of trouble. Am daily expecting to be called in defence of Neptune. Query. Am still concerned over the presence here of my daughter Hilda and the man Teasdale. Why? The answer to this may reveal the clue. But there are many comings and goings against me especially since the disappearance of Ann. Above all I must protect myself and hold myself in complete readiness.
A sound disturbed him and he looked up peevishly. Aunt Carrie had come in—Caroline was always coming in; why couldn’t she leave him alone? He shut his writing-book jealously and crouched in the chair very shrunken and angry and suspicious.
“You haven’t taken your rest, Richard.”
“I don’t want my rest.”
“Very well, Richard.” Aunt Carrie did not insist; she looked at Richard with that sad and tender gaze, her eyes red around the rims and swollen about the lids. Aunt Carrie’s heart gushed towards Richard; poor dear Richard, it was dreadful that he should not know and yet it might be worse, even, if he did. Aunt Carrie could not bear to think of it.
“I want to ask you, Caroline.” The dull suspicious eye became shot with a coaxing playfulness. “Tell me, Caroline, what are they doing at the Neptune?”
“Why, nothing, Richard,” she stammered.
“I’ve got my interests to safeguard,” Richard said with great cunning. “A man must look after himself. A man who is tampered with like me. You understand, Caroline.”
A painful silence. Aunt Carrie said again, pleadingly:
“Don’t you think you should rest a little now, Richard?” Dr. Lewis was always insisting that Richard should have more rest but Richard would not rest more. Aunt Carrie was sure it would help Richard’s poor head if Richard rested more.
Richard said:
“Why is Hilda here?”
Aunt Carrie smiled with a watery brightness.
“Why, she’s come up to see you, Richard, and to see Arthur. Grace might have come too… only she’s going to have another baby…. You remember, Richard dear, I told you.”
“Why do all these people keep coming about the house?”
“Why.” Aunt Carrie’s watery smile was brave; not wild horses would have dragged the truth from her. If Richard must know he would not know from her. “Why, what people. Richard? Now do come and rest. I beg of you.”
He glared at her, his irritation mounting to a fever heat, then leaving him suddenly; and when his irritation left him he felt quite bewildered. His pale ringed eyes fell and he discovered his own hand that held the diary shaking violently. Often his hands would twitch this way and his legs too. It was the electricity. All at once he wanted to cry.
“Very well.” Drooping, and with a childish desire for sympathy, he explained: “It’s the current that makes me… the electricity.”
Aunt Carrie helped him from his chair and helped him upstairs and helped him partially to undress and to stretch himself out upon his bed. He looked an old exhausted man and his face was very flushed. He fell asleep instantly and slept for two hours. He snored heavily.
When he awoke he felt splendid, completely refreshed and full of vigour and intelligence. He ate his bread and milk greedily, a lovely big bowl of bread and milk. It tasted sweet and pulpy and it was not burning in his mouth and his hand did not twitch with electricity any longer. He looked to see that Aunt Carrie had gone out of the room; then he licked up the last of the bowlful with his tongue. It always tasted better that way.
Afterwards he lay staring at the ceiling clasping the warmth in his stomach and hearing the buzz of a blue-bottle on the window-pane and letting warm thoughts buzz through his head and being conscious of his own prodigious capabilities. All sorts of projects and conjectures flashed through his prodigiously capable mind. There was even a marriage ceremony at the back of it all, dim and warm, with music, great swelling organ music and a slender virgin of unsurpassable beauty who adored him.
He was lying like this when the noise of cars arriving disturbed him. He raised himself on his elbow, l
istening, and with great quickness he understood that people were coming. A look of delighted cunning flashed into his face. This was his chance, a great chance while the electricity was off.
He got up. It was not easy for him to get up, the movements were complicated and numerous, but with such prodigious capabilities nothing was impossible. He worked himself sideways upon his elbow and rolled off the bed. He fell with a bump in the kneeling position. He waited for a minute, listening to see if anybody had heard the bump. Good! No one had heard the bump. He crawled on his knees to the window and looked out of the window. One car, two cars; it was exciting now, he was enjoying himself, he wanted to laugh.