by John Jakes
Margaret finished at the stove and sat down. Eleanor swatted another invisible insect. She fixed her luminous brown eyes on her mother, who turned to a page marked with a slip of lace.
“Oh,” Margaret said abruptly, “you mustn’t forget to tell Daphnis what we discovered about his name.”
Gideon nodded. “I won’t.”
She began to read aloud from the collection of President Johnson’s public speeches. The book came from Jephtha’s parsonage library.
“‘The tendency of the legislation in this country is to build up monopolies—’” She glanced at her husband. “Monopolies?”
The ritual reading had begun two years earlier, prompted by Gideon’s desire to familiarize himself with America’s history and the flow of political and economic thought to the present day. It was Margaret who’d first suggested that she read aloud in the evening. She’d pointed out that Andrew Johnson had learned the same way. In his tailor shop in Tennessee, he’d paid men fifty cents an hour to read to him while he cut cloth and stitched seams.
She’d begun with the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. Her patience and good humor had eased him through the first weeks in which many of the concepts made only a dim kind of sense. Now he’d progressed far enough so that he enjoyed the challenge of a question, and the chance to show his mastery of an idea.
“Monopolies are groups—small groups—controlling a type of business.”
Margaret nodded encouragement.
“They usually agree privately to fix their pricing.”
“What do you call a man who does that?”
Gideon rubbed his forehead. God, there was so much to know. He dredged up the answer.
“Monopolist?”
“Yes.” Her smile heartened him. “The practice itself is monopolism.”
“Ism,” he repeated. He smiled. “As in Vanderbiltism.”
She laughed. “I don’t think it’s in the dictionary, but it’s apt.” She returned to the book. “Build up monopolies—here we go. ‘The tendency of legislation is to build up the power of money. To concentrate it in the hands of the few. The tendency is for classes, and against the great mass of the people.’ ”
“Sure is true of the Erie,” he observed. “The directors run it for themselves, not the passengers. Workers don’t count for a hoot either. The directors should remember what happened to old King George.”
“But the law doesn’t provide for railroad passengers to have any voice in running a line. Or laboring men, for that matter.”
“Maybe the law’s wrong. Maybe the Erie directors see to it. Maybe things should be changed.”
Margaret was staring at him in a curious way.
“What did I do?” he asked.
“Nothing. You just sound like one of those trade unionists again.”
He realized she was right. It disturbed him. “Shoot, I was only thinking out loud.”
He started at the sound of a fist hammering on the back door. He opened the door to admit Daphnis Miller and a blast of wintry air.
Eleanor let out a screech as the air hit her. Miller lurched as Gideon slammed the door. Gideon’s neighbor was bundled in a patched Union Army overcoat. A woolen cap covered his ears and forehead. A scarf was tied around the lower half of his face.
“You’re early, Daphnis,” Gideon said. Closing the book, Margaret looked almost as disappointed as her husband.
The scarf muffled Miller’s voice. “Gonna be a hard tramp to the yards. Sleet’s been comin’ down like sixty for the last fifteen minutes.”
Miller flicked droplets of water from his gray brows. He weaved to the range, extending hands encased in several pairs of mittens. “Real bitch of a night—oops. Beg your pardon, ladies.”
Gideon started into the bedroom. He smelled the beer with which his neighbor had fortified himself.
“Maybe they’ll cancel most of the runs, Daphnis,” Margaret said.
“Not unless she drifts too bad. Gid, you better fetch an extra pair of mittens if you got ’em.”
“I haven’t,” he called, returning with the ragged Confederate greatcoat he’d brought home from Fort Delaware. He put it on, donned his forage cap, stretched a muffler over the top of his head, and knotted it under his chin. Margaret raised on tiptoe to kiss him.
“Don’t take any needless chances.”
He patted her arm. “I won’t.” He was concerned about Miller, who had apparently continued to imbibe after coming home from the Lager Palace. In Miller’s household, necessities were often sacrificed to pay for alcohol. Gideon religiously avoided drinking before going to work. Beer or spirits slowed response time. To survive in the yards, you had to be quick.
“Bolt the doors when I leave,” he said to Margaret.
“I thought I’d go over and help Flo with her laundry.”
“Mighty kind of you,” Miller mumbled. “Those four youngsters can sure dirty a bale of clothes.”
“Take Eleanor with you,” Gideon advised. “And when you come back, lock up again. There are too many men out of work wandering around.”
Bristling a bit, Margaret said, “Gideon Kent, I’m perfectly capable of looking after myself!”
He grinned. “I know. I keep forgetting. See you in the morning.”
“Either that,” Miller wheezed, “or a representative of the Erie will bring condolences.”
Margaret flared. “That’s a poor joke, Daphnis!”
He looked wearily contrite. Gideon hustled him to the door, then bent down to hug Eleanor. As he straightened, Margaret flung an arm around his neck.
“Be very careful.”
“Will be. Promise.” To Eleanor, he said, “Whose girl are you?”
“Yours!” She blew him a kiss with both hands.
He tugged the door shut behind him, almost reeling in the blast of wind that howled through the tiny back yard. Miller waved his arms, losing his balance on the steps. Gideon caught him and held him steady. With his toe he tested the exposed edge of the porch. Slippery as glass.
The sleet was freezing wherever it hit. He didn’t blame Margaret for worrying. He was worried too.
Chapter VI
The Accident
i
THE WHITE WORLD OF the storm dimmed lamps in distant cottages and drove stinging sleet against Gideon’s exposed upper cheeks. The wind blew with such force, he felt as if a huge man were trying to push him back at every step. Before he and Miller had completed half of the two-mile trek to the yards, he was laboring for breath.
Ruts in the deserted streets were rapidly filling with a treacherous accumulation of frozen snow. It crunched under foot. Gideon knew it would cling to the metal of the cars they’d be coupling. Cling and freeze.
Miller’s gait continued to be erratic. But he kept up a nonstop conversation, another indication that he’d drunk too much. Several times Gideon yelled, “Can’t hear you!” Miller simply kept talking.
It seemed they’d been trudging for hours. Suddenly Miller yanked his arms, then jammed his face close to the scarf covering Gideon’s left ear.
“You promised—more’n two weeks ago!”
Gideon shook his head. He had no idea what Miller meant.
A switch engine whistled in the murk. They were close to the yards. In spite of the weather, service hadn’t stopped.
The older man shook his arm doggedly. “Gid, you promised! You said you were readin’ that fairy story book at supper—”
He understood what his friend wanted. Margaret had urged him to mention it and he’d forgotten. “Myths,” he bawled back. “A book by Bulfinch.”
“Bull what?” Miller almost took a tumble. Gideon grabbed Miller’s overcoat and helped him right himself. They leaned into the wind again.
“Finch. Finch!”
Months ago, Miller had begun badgering him about his first name. The railroad man’s parents had been illiterate farmers in the Mohawk River Valley. Few people with whom Miller came in contact were conversant with an
ything but the daily papers. He’d appealed to Gideon to help him discover the origin and meaning of Daphnis.
So on Jephtha’s last visit, Gideon had asked him for any book which might contain the answer Miller sought. Jephtha had located a volume on his shelves and posted it to Jersey City. This was no time to discuss it, though.
“Come on, Gid!” Miller sounded peevish. “Tell me what the book says.”
They turned a corner and started down a dark street of warehouses next to the yards. At the end of the street, the light box of a slow-moving locomotive glared. The buildings shielded them from the worst of the wind; conversation was easier.
“How much beer have you had today, Daphnis?”
“Plenty. I said, plenty. Knew it was gonna be a pistol of a night. Now what’d you find out?”
A gust of wind blurred Gideon’s answer.
“You won’t tell me,” Miller growled. “It’s a woman’s name. My mama gave me a woman’s name. I always knew it.”
“She did not. It’s a perfectly proper man’s name. The original Daphnis was a Greek shepherd.”
Miller’s grumbling told Gideon he couldn’t hear. Cold and irritated, Gideon roared, “Sheep! Daphnis herded sheep!”
“That the honest to God truth?”
“Yes.”
“My daddy kept some sheep—tell me the rest.”
Gideon coughed. His throat was growing raw. “Daphnis played music on some kind of pipe or flute. He fooled around with a”—he could see the word: Naiad; he wasn’t sure how to pronounce it—“a girl who lived in the water all the time.”
“You say they were Greeks?” Miller cried. “Like the Greeks comin’ off the boats with the Slovaks and the Dutchmen and the Jews? The kind of Greeks you see at Castle Garden and Wards Island?”
“No. They weren’t real people. It’s just an old story. A legend. Now keep quiet till we get in where it’s warm.”
He doubted he’d ever be warm again.
ii
They cleared the line of warehouses. To the left, between switch tracks, haloed lamplight shone from the shack belonging to the yard superintendent. The locomotive he’d glimpsed was chugging in the other direction, already hidden behind eight white-roofed freight cars.
They hurried toward the shack. Miller chuckled.
“Well, by God, I finally found out I wasn’t named for my silly female—Gid, I truly thank you. First time we met in that prison train, I knew you were all right.”
Gideon laughed, practically pushing his friend toward the shack. As a result he nearly lost his balance. Every exposed surface in the yards was covered with ice.
Miller blundered against the door, yanked it open, and careened inside. Gideon followed. The corner stove created a welcome island of heat.
Water dripped from the coats of both men. Miller slumped on a bench and appeared to study his mittens. ‘Named for a damn Greek sheep herder. D’you fancy that?”
The night superintendent, a short balding man named Cuthbertson, sat at a desk in front of a board. The board displayed the numbers and departure times of a dozen trains. Chalk lines had been run through all but two.
Cuthbertson jerked a foul-smelling black cigar out of his mouth. “Hallo, Gid. Who’s your mush-mouthed friend?”
Miller’s watering eyes blinked above the scarf. “Cuthie, kiss my sheep.”
Cuthbertson looked dour. “You been puttin’ in too much saloon time, Daphnis. Again.”
“He’s just tired,” Gideon lied. The wind rattled grimy windows. The icy crust of a four-inch snow buildup glittered on the outer sills.
Gideon sat on the bench and dragged the muffler away from his mouth. His lips and chin felt numb. So did his fingers and feet. He peeled off his soggy mittens and hung them on the stove’s open door.
“What’s the situation, Cuthie?”
The superintendent pointed to the board. “All the passenger runs are canceled. We got two freights to make up, starting with the eight-thirty for Albany.” Those were probably the uncoupled cars Gideon had seen as he approached.
“Maybe I could work with someone else,” he suggested. “Daphnis could rest and handle the second train.”
“I ain’t got anyone else!” Cuthbertson snapped. Despite his perpetually brusque manner, he wasn’t a bad sort. Just overworked, and hampered by inferior equipment. “We been hit by another of those mysterious plagues. Happens every time it snows.”
“You mean nobody else reported?”
“Nobody.”
Gideon’s frown deepened. Four switch crews of two men each usually worked the shift.
“I can’t wait to hear all the touching tales,” Cuthbertson snorted. “Chilblains. Flux. A sudden call to visit a sick friend. I know who that is. The barkeep at the Diamond N. Oh, we’ll have a grand session of lying tomorrow!”
Melted snow trickled off Gideon’s boots and formed little pools around his toes. The superintendent jerked his head at Miller and raised his eyebrows. Miller didn’t notice. He was still contemplating his mittens and mumbling.
“Sure, we’ll get it done,” Gideon said in reply to Cuthbertson’s silent question. His eye drifted to the open stove. In the flames he saw Augustus Kolb. The man had been thirty-one at the time of the accident.
Cuthbertson lit a second cigar from the stub of the first. “You don’t exactly seem the soul of cheer tonight.”
“Oh—” Gideon untied his scarf, took off his forage cap, then his mittens. He used his fingers like the teeth of a comb, raking snow out of the hair around his ears. Cuthbertson was waiting for an answer. “For some reason I’ve been thinking a lot about Augie Kolb today.”
Cuthbertson nearly took his head off. “Why?”
Irked by the reaction, Gideon retorted, “I just have.” He noticed the superintendent’s face. “Cuthie, what’s wrong? Something is. Tell me.”
Cuthbertson exhaled a cloud of smoke. “They found Gerda early this morning.”
“Gerda Kolb?” A nod. “Where?”
Miller’s chin had dropped onto the lap of his overcoat. He snored softly.
After more prodding from Gideon, Cuthbertson said, “One of the youngsters found her in the shed behind their cottage. She used strips from a blanket to hang herself.”
iii
“My God. She was expecting!”
“Don’t you let on I told you! I got orders from the headquarters in Manhattan. Ain’t to be no reports of accidents in the papers. The bosses are gettin’ whipped plenty hard enough over this stock war. I hear Vanderbilt’s after a majority of the shares, and Gould wants all the favorable publicity his side can get. With him and his chums playin’ their games, it don’t help to have engines derailed and switchmen’s wives doing themselves in—”
Cuthbertson stopped, peering at the end of his cigar. He pressed his chest as if his digestion were upset.
“Why would Gerda Kolb kill herself?” Gideon asked. “She had Augie to care for. Two boys to support. A child on the way.”
A weary shrug. “I s’pose that’s the very reason. Too many mouths and no money. You know the line didn’t give Augie one cent after the accident.”
“What’ll happen to the boys?”
“I guess they’ll take to the streets. Steal. It’s that or starve.”
“Jesus. You’d think someone high up would have the decency to pay them something.”
“Why, no,” Cuthbertson said. “High up, they got more important matters to think about. Meaning no disrespect to any relative of yours,” the superintendent added sarcastically.
Gideon waved. “I don’t know a thing about Louis Kent except what my father and the newspapers tell me. I gather Louis is the kind who wouldn’t spend a dime to put flowers on his mother’s grave—damn it, Cuthie, we ought to force the line to do something for men who die or get hurt!”
“Go right ahead. Call on your cousin! You might start lookin’ for another job at the same time.”
“Job or no job, someone’s got to stand up
for people like Augie’s widow and kids.”
“Not me. I like my three squares and a roof over my head.” The superintendent rose. “You and Daphnis better start making up the eight-thirty. Provided you can get him on his feet.”
“Daphnis—”
Gideon prodded the older man. Miller snorted. He shifted sideways on the bench, slow to rouse.
Cuthbertson lifted the angled lid of a storage box. He pulled out a pair of yard-long clubs of hickory wood.
“You boys want these? The links and pins may be froze pretty bad.”
Miller was awake. “Listen, Cuthie. As long as I’ve been with the Erie, I’ve never used the staff of ignorance. I don’t propose to start now.”
“How about you, Gid?”
Gideon shook his head, settling his cap and retying the scarf. The brakeman’s clubs were helpful in coupling cars. But experienced men considered using one to be an indication of inferior skill and a lack of confidence. Cuthbertson tossed the clubs back into the box and slammed the lid. Out in the storm, a whistle blew twice.
“The lads are waitin’ on you,” Cuthbertson said.
Gideon brought two lanterns from the corner. He stuck a twist of straw into the stove and used it to fire the wicks. He handed one lantern to Miller, who almost dropped it before he worked the bail over his arm.
Bundling up, Gideon was still upset by the news of Gerda Kolb’s hanging herself, killing her unborn child in the process. It wouldn’t have happened if the line compensated men for injuries and provided postmortem benefits for widows. He thought of Jeb Stuart.
Stay together. Press right on toward the objective—together.
He saw the burned shawl of Bill Sylvis.
Organize.
Like Cuthbertson, he didn’t really want to lead the way into what would inevitably become a storm of conflict and controversy.
Still, he couldn’t escape one truth. Until someone led, the problem would never be solved.
Miller lumbered to the door and jerked it open. The storm tearing through the yards drove the imaginary one out of Gideon’s mind.
iv
They tramped toward the switch locomotive, the glowing lanterns hanging from their arms. As they negotiated the ice-covered ties on the track beside the eight boxcars, Gideon shouted that he’d take the first, the one to be connected to the switcher’s tender.