XV. A Strike

"No cars a-runnin'! What's up?" exclaimed Jimmy, the next morning, as he and Theodore passed down Tremont street.

"There's a strike on. Didn't you hear 'bout it yesterday?" replied Theo.

"No. My! But there'll be a time if all the cars stop."

"A pretty bad time--'specially for the folks that live outside the city," Theodore answered, soberly.

When, after taking his breakfast at the stand, he went back through Tremont street, groups of men and boys were standing about in every corner, and everywhere the strike was the one topic of conversation. There were groups of motormen and conductors here and there, some looking grave and anxious, and some careless and indifferent.

As the morning advanced the throngs in the streets increased. Belated business men hurried along, and clerks and saleswomen with flushed faces and anxious eyes, tried impatiently to force their way through the crowds to get to their places of business.

Theodore noticed the large number of rough-looking men and boys on the streets, and that most of them seemed full of suppressed excitement. Now and then as he passed some of these, he caught a low-spoken threat, or an exultant prophecy of lively times to come. It all made him vaguely uneasy, and he had to force himself to go about his work instead of lingering outside to see what would happen.

In one office, while he was busy over the brasses, three gentlemen were discussing the situation, and the boy, as he rubbed and polished, listened intently to what was said.

"What do the fellows want? What's their grievance, anyhow?" inquired one man, impatiently, as he flicked the ashes from his cigar.

"Shorter hours and better pay," replied a second.

"Of course. That's what strikers always want," put in a third. "They seem to think they're the only ones to be considered."

"Well, I must confess that I rather sympathise with the men this time," said the second speaker. "I hold that they ought to have shorter hours."

"There are plenty that will be glad enough to take their places, though."

"I suppose so, but all the same I maintain that these companies that are amply able to treat their men better, ought to do so. I believe in fair play. It pays best in the end to say nothing of the right and wrong of it."

"Think the company will give in?" questioned one.

"Guess not. I hear that the superintendent has telegraphed to New York and Chicago for men."

"There'll be trouble if they come!" exclaimed the first speaker.

"I believe," said another man, joining the group, "I believe that Sanders is responsible for all this trouble--or the most of it, anyhow. He's a disagreeable, overbearing fellow who--even when he grants a favor, which is seldom enough--does it in a mean, exasperating fashion that takes all the pleasure out of it. I had some dealings with him once, and I never want anything more to do with him. If he'd been half-way decent to the men there would never have been any strike, in my opinion."

Sanders was the superintendent of the road where the trouble was.

"You're right about Sanders," said another. "I always have wondered how he could keep his position. These strikes though, never seem to me to do any real good to the cause of the strikers, and a great many of the men realise that too, but these walking delegate fellows get 'round 'em and persuade 'em that a strike is going to end all their troubles--and so it goes. I saw that little sneak--Tom Steel--buttonholing the motormen, and cramming them with his lies, as I came along just now. There's always mischief where Tom Steel is."

By this time Theodore had finished his work, and he left the office, his head full of strikes, superintendents, and walking delegates, and wherever he went that day, the strike was the only subject discussed.

He stopped work earlier than usual, finding himself infected with the prevailing unrest and excitement. He found the sidewalks of the principal business streets thronged with men, women and boys, all pressing in one direction.

"Come along, Tode!" cried a shrill voice at his elbow, and he turned to find Jimmy Hunt, his round face all alight with anticipation of exciting episodes to follow. Jimmy began talking rapidly.

"They've been smashin' cars, Tode, an' haulin' off the motormen an' conductors that want to keep on workin'. There's three cars all smashed up near the sheds, an' the strikers say they'll wreck every one that's run out to-day."

"It's a shame!" declared Theo, indignantly; yet boy-like, if there was to be a mob fight, he wanted to be on hand and see it all, and he took care not to let Jimmy get far ahead of him.

As they went on, the crowd continually increased until it became so dense that the boys had to worm their way through it inch by inch. They pressed on, however, and when further progress was impossible, they found standing room on the very front close to the car-track.

It had been a noisy, blustering crowd as it surged along the street, but now that it had come to a standstill, a sudden breathless silence fell upon it, and all eyes turned in one direction, gazing eagerly, intently up the track. Suddenly, a low, hoarse cry broke from a hundred throats.

"It's comin'! It's comin'!" and far up the street a car appeared.

The faces of the men grew more hard and determined. Those of the women became pale and terrified. The two boys peered eagerly forward, their hearts beating quickly, with dread mingled with a sort of wild excitement.

"Look, Theo--Look!" whispered Jimmy, pointing to some men who were hastily digging up cobble-stones from the street. "There's Carrots, too," he added.

"Wonder who that little chap is--the one that seems to have so much to say to the car men," Theo replied, thoughtfully.

"That's Tom Steel. You've heard of him, hain't ye?" A man at Theo's elbow was speaking. "He's responsible for this strike, I think, an' I hope he'll get his pay for it too," he added, grimly.

Theodore glanced up into the grave face of the speaker and recognised him as a motorman. Evidently, he was more bitter against the strikers than against the company.

The car was now close at hand, and all at once as with a single impulse, there was a surging forward, and the crowd closed in blocking the track with a solid mass of human beings. The motorman set his teeth hard, and rang the gong loudly, insistently. The conductor hastened through the car and stood beside him. The only passenger was a policeman, who stood on the rear platform calmly gazing at the sea of angry, excited faces on either side.

"This car's got to stop!" shouted a big, brawny fellow, springing onto the step and giving the motorman a threatening glance.

"This car ain't a-goin' to stop!" retorted the motorman, grimly, as he released the brake.

"We'll see about that," and with the words the big fellow seized the man's arms and wrenched his hand off the lever.

The conductor sprang to the assistance of his comrade while the policeman ran forward and pushed the man roughly off the car.

In the same instant, Theo saw Carrots snatch a box from a bootblack near him and with a wild yell of defiance, hurl it through one of the car windows. The shrill, taunting cry of the boy, mingled with the crash of the breaking glass, and the sight of the policeman's upraised club, aroused the mob to sudden fury. At once there arose a wild hubbub of shouts, yells and cries, followed by a shower of cobble-stones, and a fierce rush upon the three men on the car, and in two minutes the car was a shattered wreck; the motorman and conductor were being hustled through the crowd with threats and warnings, while the policeman's club had been wrenched from his grasp. He drew his pistol, but with a howl of fury it was knocked from his hand, and the next moment he lay senseless upon the ground, felled by a savage blow from his own club.

The taste of conflict, the sight of blood, had roused to a fierce flame the smouldering spirit of lawlessness and insurrection in the mob. A savage rage seemed to have taken possession of the men as, with frantic haste and mad delight, they tore up cobble-stones and built a huge barricade across the track. When it was completed, Carrots darted up on top of it and waved a red handkerchief above his head. A hoarse roar of approval broke from the mob, but Steel sternly ordered the boy down and hissed in his ear,

"You fool! You might have spoiled everything by that! Don't ye show that again till I give the signal--d'ye hear?"

Carrots nodded with an evil gleam in his narrow eyes, that made Theo shiver.

"Come on, now. We've done enough for once," Steel added, and keeping his hand on the arm of the boy the two disappeared in the throng that was slowly melting away.

Then, with a long breath, Jimmy turned to Theodore.

"My!" he exclaimed, in a tone of shuddering satisfaction. "It's awful, ain't it, Theo! S'pose he's dead?" He gazed with half fearful interest toward the policeman who had been clubbed and about whom a group had gathered.

"Looks like it. There comes some more p'lice. They'll take care of him. Come on, Jimmy, le's go home."

"Oh, no, Theo, don't go home, yet. Le's go an' see what's goin' on over there," and Jimmy turned into a cross street through which the greater portion of the crowd was pressing.

"There's something the matter over at the depot," said Theodore, as he followed, half willingly and half reluctantly, in Jimmy's eager footsteps.

About the depot there was usually a constant stream of cars coming and going, but to-day the streets looked bare and deserted.

When the boys reached the square only two cars were in sight and these two were approaching, one behind the other, on the same track. As they drew near, they were seen to contain each six or eight policemen, fully armed and with stern, resolute faces. The mob again howled and hooted at the motormen and conductors, and showered them with dirt and small stones, but made no attempt to stop the cars.

No cars were run after dark that evening, and the next day they were run only at intervals of an hour and each one carried a heavily armed guard. The strikers and their lawless sympathisers continued to throng the streets and to threaten all car-men who remained on duty. Now and then a car window was broken or an obstruction placed on the tracks, but there was no serious outbreak, and it was rumoured that a compromise between the company and the strikers was under consideration and that the trouble would soon be at an end.

So a week slipped away. One morning Theodore was on his way from one office to another when he heard the sound of drum and fife and saw a body of the strikers marching up Washington street. Every boy within sight or hearing at once turned in after the procession, and Theodore followed with the rest.

It was about ten o'clock in the morning and the streets were full of shoppers, many of them ladies who had been afraid to venture out during the past week.

As if they had risen out of the ground, scores of rough-looking men and street boys began to push and jostle the shoppers on the narrow sidewalks until many of the frightened women took refuge in the stores, and the shopkeepers, fearful of what might follow, began hastily putting up their shutters and making ready to close their stores, if necessary. These signs of apprehension gave great delight to the rougher element in the streets, and they yelled and hooted uproariously at the cautious shopkeepers, but they did not stop. Steadily, swiftly they followed that body of men marching with dark, determined faces to the sound of the fife and the drum.

"Where are they going?" Theo asked of a man at his side and the reply was,

"To the car-house, I reckon. They're ripe for mischief now."

"What's stirred 'em up again--anything new?" the boy questioned.

"Many of the strikers have been discharged and new men brought on--five hundred of them--from New York and Chicago. I'm afraid we haven't seen the worst of the troubles yet."

"Look! Look!" cried a boy, close beside Theodore, and the latter looking ahead, saw a squad of mounted officers coming through a cross street. Without stopping to parley they charged into the marching strikers and dispersed them, silencing the fife and drum, and when the furious mob of followers and sympathisers yelled threats and defiance at the officers, the latter charged into the mob riding up to the pavement and forcing the people back into the stores and dwellings behind them.

This was as fuel to the fire of anger and insurrection. Deep and dire threats passed from lip to lip, and evil purpose hardened into grim determination as the mob slowly surged in the direction of the car-house, after the officers had passed on. The throng was far more quiet now, and far more dangerous. Again and again, Theodore caught glimpses of Tom Steel's insignificant face, and like a long, dark shadow, Carrots followed ever at his heels.

No cars were running now, but the boy heard low-spoken references to new men and "scabs," and "the will of the people," as, almost without effort of his own, he was borne onward with the throng.

At a little distance from the car-house the strikers again drew together and stood mostly in gloomy silence, their eyes ever turning toward the closed doors of the great building before them. The vast crowd waited, too, in a silence that seemed to throb and pulse with intense and bitter feeling. The strikers had stopped in the middle of the street, and around them on every side, except toward the car-house, the crowd pressed and surged like a vast human sea. There were not many women in the number gathered there, and the few who were there were of the lowest sort, but men and boys--largely tramps, roughs and street boys--were there in countless numbers, mingled with not a few of the better class.

Slowly the minutes passed, until an hour had gone by, and it began to be whispered about that the company dared not run any cars. Still the men waited, and the crowd waited too. But at last some grew weary of inaction, and when Steel proposed that they spend the time barricading the tracks, his suggestion met with a quick response.

From a neighbouring street the men brought Belgian blocks and piled them on the track. They pulled down tree boxes and broke off branches of trees, and when an ice wagon came along they took possession of the huge blocks of ice and capped their barricade with these.

Suddenly the doors of the car-house were thrown open, and a car rolled slowly out.

There was an instant of breathless silence, followed by a roar like that of a thousand savage beasts, as the strikers saw that new men were running the car, and that it carried half a score of policemen, armed to the teeth.

As it approached the barricade some of the officers sprang off and began to throw down the obstructions, the others standing ready to fire upon the mob if necessary. The crowd showered bitter words and taunts upon the officers, but did not venture to molest them. The motorman stood with his hand on the lever, ready to start the car the moment the track should be clear. Carrots, with a pack of street Arabs at his heels, jeered at the new motorman, climbing up on the car and taunting him, until, at last, his patience was exhausted, and he suddenly lifted his foot and kicked one of the boys off the car. The boy fell heavily to the ground, and instantly the shrill voice of Carrots was uplifted, crying frantically,

"He's killed Billy Green! He's killed Billy Green! Pitch in to him, boys! Pitch into him!"

Billy Green was already picking himself up, with no worse injury than a cut in his cheek, but the mob took up the cry, and,

"Pitch into him! Pitch into him! Kill him! Kill him!" was shouted by hundreds of savage voices as the crowd pressed about the car. They tried to drag the motorman off, in spite of the guards, they smashed the car windows, they tore out the cushions, they beat the policemen, and wrenched their clubs out of their hands. Finally several of the officers drew their pistols and fired into the air.

At this the crowd fell back for a second, and the turmoil of shouts and cries that had been deafening a moment before, died away in sudden silence--a threatening, dangerous silence as of a wild beast about to spring.

Into this instant of silence broke a new cry from the outskirts of the crowd.

"It's the mayor. Make way for the mayor!"

"No, it's the bishop. Make way for the bishop! Stand back! Stand back!"

At this cry, Theodore turned like a flash and gazed in the direction in which all eyes were turning. There was no mistake. The bishop was surely one of the occupants of a carriage that was slowly forcing its way through the throng.

With his heart beating with a wild joy; his eyes glowing; the colour coming and going in his cheeks, Theodore stood still until the carriage stopped. Then sliding through the smallest spaces, darting between feet, this way and that, the boy managed somehow to reach the side of the carriage, where he stood with his hand on one of the wheels, his eager, burning gaze fastened on the face he loved so well. Instinctively he pulled off his cap, but he made no attempt to attract the attention of the bishop. He uttered no word or sound. He only stood with all his loving heart in his eyes, and looked.

The bishop's expression was very grave, as he gazed over that vast sea of faces. He turned to speak to the gentleman who sat beside him, and as he did so, his eyes fell on Theodore's eloquent upturned countenance. A quick, bright smile flashed across his face, and reaching down, he laid his hand for a moment gently upon the boy's bared head.

Before he could speak the silence was again broken by a cry from many lips--a cry of warning now, rather than a threat, though again the words were,

"Stop the car! Stop the car! The bishop! The bishop!"

The bishop's carriage had come to a standstill directly across the track, the crowd being here so dense that it was impossible for the driver to go even a yard farther.

The policemen had cleared the barricade from the track, and then sprung hastily on the car again. Evidently they had not noticed the dangerous position of the carriage, and now the motorman started the car forward. The man was a stranger in the city. He knew nothing about the bishop--cared nothing about him. He was there to run that car, and he meant to do it or die in the attempt, so when the crowd shouted,

"The bishop! The bishop!" he yelled in reply,

"Get out of the way then if you don't want him hurt. This car's a-going through, bishop or no bishop!"

The car was already in motion. The crowd pushed and struggled and tried to fall back and let the carriage pass over the track, but it was impossible, so closely were the people packed together there.

On the car came, while for an instant the crowd waited with tense breath for what should follow.

"Loyal unto death." The words rang through Theodore's brain, as in that instant he sprang swiftly forward and flung himself across the track directly in front of the slowly moving car. A cry of horror broke from the throng and a score of hands were stretched forth to draw the boy from his dangerous position, but he clung to the fender and would not be removed.

"Stop the car!" he pleaded. "Oh stop the car or the bishop will be killed!"

Never a thought of his own danger had the boy,--for he would have given his young life freely and joyfully for his bishop, but the sacrifice was not needed. The police, now seeing the danger, forced the furious motorman to stop the car until the crowd had had time to fall back and the carriage had safely crossed the track. Then the car passed on followed by threatening glances and menacing words from the angry throng.

But now the bishop arose in the carriage, and as he stood in the majesty of his great height with the light of a pure heart and a holy life illumining his face--once again a hush fell upon that vast gathering, and when the rich voice rolled out upon the still air, uttering its message of heavenly love, and strong, sweet counsels of peace and justice, the hearts of the people were melted within them. Hard, brutal men and rude street boys listened, feeling a strange power that they could not understand, thrilling their souls, and compelling them, in spite of their own wills, to follow the counsels of this servant of God.

No other man in that great city was honoured and loved by rich and poor alike, as was the bishop. To no other would such a crowd in such a mood have hearkened, but they stood in silence and listened breathlessly as if they feared to lose a single word. They listened as if they knew that never again would such a message come to them from those lips. Stern, bitter faces softened, and hard eyes dimmed with tears as the burning, melting words fell on the listening ears. Women wept, and men forgot their hatreds and their grievances. Only here and there an evil face grew more evil as the bishop's words worked upon the hearts and consciences of that vast throng.

Tom Steel dropped his mask of careless indifference, as he tried to stem the tide by whispering sneers and taunts to one and another, but they would have none of his counsels now, and after a while he slunk away with a black scowl on his face and evil words on his lips, and still beside him slouched the gaunt, ragged figure with its crown of rough red hair; and no one bade them stay; no one listened to their wicked whispers, for the bishop's words were filling every ear and every heart.

At last, the bishop stretched forth his hands and pronounced a tender blessing upon them all, and then he drove slowly away, and when he was gone rough men looked into each other's faces, half wondering, half ashamed, as they moved away. They had no desire now for rioting and lawlessness--for deeds of blood and violence. The Spirit of God had touched their hearts. The atmosphere in which the bishop lived and moved and had his being had for the time enveloped even these. No wonder then, that it had wrought such a transformation in the heart and life of one little street boy.

That same night two hundred of the city clergymen united in an appeal to the company to submit the troubles to arbitration, and to this both the company and the strikers agreed. The result was that although all that the men asked was not granted, yet their hours were shortened, and an increase of pay promised at the beginning of the year.