Mr. Quillan answered, in furious condescension, “No, madam, obviously not.”
“It burns perfectly, and if anyone had told me about the flue, I would have opened it.”
“You don’t need to know about flues or driving a chaise or any of the other foolishness you are getting up to. Are you mad?”
“I am going mad, yes. I cannot stand doing nothing any longer!”
“Then do something. Do you not have needles and linen?”
“I have sewn and picked enough stitches to put Penelope to shame. I can do no more.”
“You will not start fires.”
“I will burn this place down if I am not allowed some freedom!”
There was a long pause, Quillan obviously tendering the seriousness of the threat. He cleared his throat. “Talk to Dr. Parsons about this, my dear. I will abide by what he says is the best course of action.”
“That charlatan and his ridiculous ideas of hysteria! His idea of action is inaction and you know it. Do me the favor of acknowledging I have some sense.”
“I would happily do so if I saw any evidence to support it.”
Mrs. Quillan began to shout. “This is my house, my life! I will light a fire if I choose. I will not be talked down to. It is absolutely insufferable that I am forced to answer to you, and I will not do it. I suffocate! I will not be treated so, I will not see that doctor, nor will I take his poisons!”
The professor shoved a box out the door and emerged, valise in hand, perspiring as if it were August, and slammed the door behind him. He pointed at the box. “Ned!”
I picked it up and followed the red-faced professor back to the lab. He had me stack another box on top of the first to demonstrate I could lift them both, gazing critically at the effort on my face. “Pack lightly, Ned.”
I was beginning to understand why he wanted me on his journey.
“The train leaves at seven A.M. Be here by five, in case there are any difficulties.” He brushed at his shirt, then patted his jacket pocket. “For the love of …” He sat down hard and threw up his hands. “Does nothing go right?”
“Sir?”
He brightened. “That’s it, Ned. Go back to the house. Ask Mrs. Quillan for my wallet. I left it on the bureau upstairs. Bring it to me at Anthony’s. I will be dining and staying at the club tonight.”
“Sir?”
“I have too much to do to deal with Mrs. Quillan’s histrionics tonight. This may well be the most important trip of my—of our lives.” He waved me off, then called me back. “Remember, Ned. Not a word to anyone. Everything depends on your circumspection. There are those who would do anything to thwart my progress.”
I backtracked to the professor’s house, following the fence around back, around the burning drum and the stacks of flowerpots and the pile of brush waiting for the gardener to clear off. It was there I heard the steps behind me. I thought it was perhaps the professor changing his mind, for the footfall was not at all surreptitious. I turned, smiling, only to see the thuggish duo who had accosted me previously. One of them grabbed me by the back of my jacket and pinned my arms behind my back while I yelped for help. The other clamped a hand smelling of sausages around my mouth. “We tol’ ya, didn’t we? And still you come. One more time: Don’t get mixed up with what’s not yours. This is to help you remember.” He removed his hand and punched me in the nose.
A window flew up and I heard Mrs. Quillan shout, “What is going on here?” The fellow behind me dropped my arms, I staggered back into the brush pile, and the two men hightailed it.
Mrs. Quillan was by my side in seconds. “Ned, my God, what is going on?”
I put my hand to my nose. It was pouring blood. “I don’t know.”
She shouted to the housekeeper to bring a rag. “Do you know those men?”
I shook my head. “Not really.” The housekeeper brought the rag. I gently stanched the blood from my tender nose, hoping the punch had at least bent it in the opposite direction of Buck Mason’s blow. We went into the house.
Mrs. Quillan dabbed my nose clean. “I don’t think it’s broken.” She smiled, looking amazingly happy, calm, and collected after her tirade only half an hour previous. “Though I’m sure it hurts.”
I nodded.
“Now tell me about those men. Why did they do this?”
I remembered Quillan’s admonishing me to say nothing to anyone, but certainly Mrs. Quillan should know there were nefarious characters hanging around. After all, they had attacked me at her house; perhaps they were waiting to kidnap her and I had merely stumbled into the situation. “Those roughs … approached me once before. I think they’re trying to warn me off of helping the professor.”
She laughed. “Why would they be doing that?”
I lowered my voice. “It’s the work. I can’t say much about it, but it’s very important, big money.”
She frowned. “Does this have to do with coal? The professor’s shirts have been absolutely black.”
I nodded.
She mused. “Something to do with his work, I suppose. Fossils, always fossils.”
I nodded again. “The fossils.”
“In coal?”
I put a finger to my lips. “You must be careful, Mrs. Quillan. They may have been lying in wait for you instead of me. They could be spies.”
She smiled. “Pshaw.”
“Please be careful.”
She sighed. “Oh, Ned. All I ever am is careful.”
I stood up and looked at the rag. My nose had stopped bleeding. “I think I should get going.”
Mrs. Quillan nodded. “Keep the cloth.” She pointed to her nose. “It may begin again on the way home.”
I had my hand on the door before I remembered. “Er. The professor forgot his wallet.”
Mrs. Quillan raised her eyebrows. “He needs it between now and dinner?”
I reddened. “He must need to buy the tickets to Pennsylvania.”
“He’s going to Pennsylvania?”
The professor must have forgotten to tell her in the commotion over the fire. “In the morning.”
“The station stays open until nine. He’ll have plenty of time.”
I looked out the window. Why couldn’t the professor get his own wallet? “He says he’s staying at Anthony’s tonight.”
She tightened her lips but called the housekeeper and instructed her to retrieve the wallet. When Mrs. Bryan brought it, Mrs. Quillan opened the leather envelope, counted the bills, took out a good number, and handed the wallet to me. “I’m sure he’ll understand I’ll need some cash while he’s away.”
I nodded awkwardly and took my leave.
Packing took me all of two minutes, and I was faced with the first free time I’d had for weeks. I contemplated contacting Montgomery Elias again, but what I’d found out in the last month was complicated and confusing and I decided to put off writing the letter until I returned. I wrote a short halfhearted note to Lill. I stared at the Chinese characters on the wallpaper until they turned into pictures. I read another chapter in Laramore’s book. Finally, I gave up and gave in to the sunshine pouring in from the small window over my bed. We were having a false spring. Daffodils peeked from dark mud. They would almost certainly be frozen back for their intrepidity. I bought a cone of nuts from the vendor on the corner and wandered, looking in windows and trying to enjoy the pale sunshine.
I finally lit across from the cigar shop and watched patrons walking in, then out with boxes tucked under their arms. After some time, Phaegin emerged, walking slowly, her face pale under a dark scarf. I wondered if she’d been sick. She walked toward me and stepped into the street. I cautioned myself to steer clear, to head in the other direction, and instead awaited her approach. Having crossed the street, she recognized me with a start and hurried in the other direction.
I followed.
Phaegin crossed into an alley and up Third, while I took the short cut around. She came around the building’s south side face-to-face with me. I spo
ke first. “Hello, Phaegin.”
She put her hands on her hips. “Who do you think you are?”
“What do you mean?”
“I haven’t seen you for a month.”
“I had to work.”
“So did most everyone else in the world. A kiss and you act like I’ve given you leprosy. Well, it was no more than I would give a brother, less even. And I’m sorry I gave you that. And if you’re worried that I’m thinking anything of it, I’d sooner be seeing a real donkey.”
She turned and walked away again. In spite of her not wanting to see me, or maybe because of it, I ran after her, remonstrating. “It was only work that kept me. Quillan has a big project.” She was practically running and I strode behind her, my voice raised. “Phaegin!” I reached out and grabbed her sleeve. “I’m to start at Yale in September.”
Phaegin stopped and put her hands to her neck. “Yale? But you’re poor.”
I shrugged. “Professor Quillan is sponsoring me.”
She dropped her hands and stuck one out and shook mine. “That’s wonderful, Ned. Congratulations.”
I shrugged nonchalantly. “It’s nothing.”
She pointed toward the shop. “I’ve got to get back.”
“You just left.”
“I was out for some air.”
“Let’s have lunch. Come on, Phaegin. You’re the only friend I have.”
“What, did Lill throw her knight over?” She blushed. “Never mind. Tell you what, we’ll have dinner tomorrow.”
I stuck my hands in my pockets. “I can’t. I’m leaving for Pennsylvania.”
“Oh, so this was to be a ‘So long, Sue’ kind of lunch.”
“I’m coming back.”
She reached out and put her hand over mine. “I have to go. But it’s been lovely to see you.”
“What about dinner when I get back; dinner and dancing? It should be just a few days.”
She gave my hand a squeeze and let go. “There can be nothing between us, Ned. I’ve been clear on that. I’m sorry.”
I stammered. “We’re friends, though, aren’t we?”
She smiled. “Of course. But we won’t go dancing again. The holidays are over, and I’m much busier.” She glanced at my face and sighed. “You could come by the cigar shop sometime, just to let me know what you’re up to.” She gave a nod, walking away as she called, “Congratulations again, Ned. I’m very happy for you.”
It was for the best. I trudged back to Mother’s, passing the Boola Inn. I had so longed for that better place. But now, though it finally seemed within grasp, even the scent of the roast wafting from the window didn’t cheer me up.
CHAPTER 18
Dear Ned,
I have tried. My hands are red and cracked so I cry to wash dishes. Must everything in my life be harsh? Ash for dishes, lye for clothes, cold water and splinters, even the rooster draws blood.
Dear Ned,
Will winter ever end? I wake up to ice on dark windows and it never brightens.
Dear Ned,
The baby has colic. Breaks my heart to hear her cry, then I want to put her in a snowbank. Heaven help both of us.
Dear Ned,
What happened to beauty? Certainly once my life was brilliant.
Dear Ned,
Why live if the balance of pain and pleasure is weighted so poorly?
Dear Brill,
I have finally heard again from Lill. My heart sings, “She is unhappy!” even as I die to hear of her misery.
The train trip to Pennsylvania was uneventful. We boarded the train in near silence. I imagined the professor was deep in his thoughts of science, while I ruminated over the sad letters from Lill and my sadder response to them. Both overwrought by our mentation, the professor and I fell quickly asleep to the susurrant chock of the train wheels and didn’t wake up until we were almost there.
Scranton was a city of gloom, the coal furnaces breathing into continuous darkness. The children of this place could not fathom a blue sky. It was also colder than New Haven, without the tempering effect of ocean breezes. We took a hansom to the American Coal offices, a limestone building with ornate carvings above every door and window, each cloaked in soot. I carted the boxes up the stairs and was told to wait in the lobby while the professor went into an office with a gold placard hung on it that said CORNELIUS PLACET. When the professor finally emerged, hours later, he was grinning like a dog, shaking hands with a dark-suited man wearing diamond cuff links, with a cigarette tipped rakishly in his lips. Quillan walked out of the lobby, reached the street, and called a cab. It was only when he stood with his foot on the cab step that he seemed to remember me. “Ned. Keep up, will you?”
The professor told me nothing of the proceedings. When we got to the inn where we’d spend the night, he went straight to his room while I took a cot behind the laundry.
At dawn we juddered across washboard roads for miles before arriving at American Coal’s unfortunately named Widow-maker Mine in the late morning. Wilson Dunlaw, vice president in charge of Widowmaker, met us at the control house. I found him to be an amazingly obsequious man, as rotund as Quillan and as hard to take.
“We at American Coal are exhilarated to receive a man of science as eminent as Professor Quillan to our humble concern.”
Quillan puffed. “We are pleased to be here.”
I was pretty sure Quillan was using the royal we, but I nodded in agreement.
Dunlaw inclined his head. “I am to understand that time is of the utmost importance and therefore”—he handed us each a steel hat and demonstrated wearing it by slowly lowering it onto his skull—“we shall commence our subterranean journey.”
He explained with a surplusage of words that a shaft mine was struck to provide the greatest profit, but only if the deep veins were rich. The extensive costs of digging, hoisting, and pumping proved disastrous if the bed provided less coal than expected and initial costs were never recovered.
Dunlaw’s voice dropped to a whisper. “I understand the great man has discovered a means of ascertaining the emplacement and generosity of the coal bed, thereby conserving our tremendous industrial complex’s fortune.”
We approached the elevator. I was hesitant to descend into the mines. Standing at the mouth of the shaft, I could feel the rush of air escaping, as if even the wind knew better than to tarry below.
Dunlaw warned us of the fluctuating temperatures. We would first experience cold, farther down the air would be warm, then heat great enough at the lowest seams to melt candles. Dunlaw waved an arm, knocked on his steel skull, and shouted gaily, “Let the entertainment commence!”
The steel caps each had a sconce attached in which balanced a candlestick behind a mesh enclosure. We lit our candles and descended into the mines on an open platform called a cage, supported by a wrist-thick steel cable—a thin security. Descending slowly, a tortured creaking and groaning emanating from the ropes, Dunlaw grinned as if the noise was melody itself.
We dropped ten men’s height, then twenty, then thirty. Soon we’d not have climbed out if our fellows were a hundred strong and willing to stand on one another’s shoulders. Sunlight was lost. The candles flickered and tossed weedy shadows on the black walls.
Dunlaw’s good humor only slipped when the basket that served as counterweight to the platform almost collided with us in “a wedding.” Dunlaw lost the grin and swore, “Goddamn it!” but when the basket rose out of sight he laughed. “Miss is as good as a mile, men.”
By the time we reached the mine’s floor, my heart was pounding, my stomach moiled, and my skin was clammy at the 50 degrees on the floor of the first seam. The eye of the shaft in which we had descended winked, a sad and singular star in a night of coal. The air smelled of sulfur and ordure. Our nervous candles sporadically illuminated low overhead beams, sagging across the ceiling of the mine.
The hole in the earth was initially as wide as the Philadelphia train station, narrowing as its many legs slithered back and away into
perpetual black. The idea that the thin steel carapace on my skull could do anything to protect me from a hundred million tons of coal and earth over my head now seemed more than ridiculous, as were the supports for the earth above us. Twelve-by-twelve-inch timbers, propped up with other twelve-by-twelve timbers, tatted a lacy construction of wood against rock. One would better expect toothpicks to support a Clydesdale.
Coal cars appeared and disappeared in the wavering light, and the black smudged faces of miners, eyes ghostly aglow in the lamplight, presented a spectral pickax minstrel show as they worked. Coal glistened on the walls as if wet, yet it was dry as dust.
From this ghastly blackness came the dissonance of picks and shovels, ringing like mad wind chimes in the stagnant air. Trips rumbled by, pulled by mules, their dark bodies virtually invisible but for the insides of their ears, the thin circlet of white around their brown eyes, and the surprise of teeth when the animals brayed.
I could barely hold back my terror. I calmed myself by feigning scientific interest in the dark walls, by anticipating recounting the experience to Phaegin, by composing a letter to Lill detailing hell, and so trudged along, barely attending the reports of production and richness, veins, strikes, and future direction, as I dodged swells of panic.
Dunlaw turned at a hacking cough at his elbow. Jim McNulty, the foreman for the Lucky Lady shaft, warned, “There’s been a cave-in at the south tunnel, won’t be opened till day’s end.”
The term cave-in yielded a new wave of dizziness, but then my attention was drawn by a small scream and a wail.
McNulty’s owl eyes saw what I could not. He shouted with exasperation, “Put ’im on the wagon if he can’t handle the pick.” A boy who looked no older than seven trudged by, examining his hand and wrapping his dirty handkerchief around it. My first thought was that it seemed ludicrous to have the nicety of a handkerchief in this filthy hole. I leaned over to McNulty. “How old is that boy?”
“Eleven years old, he is. Danny Rate. Good worker mostly, but puny for the pick. His family’s longtime coal people.”
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