HEROES OF THE UNDERWORLD
Matters were now much easier and more comfortable for Geordie Sinclair
and his wife. They had long since added another apartment to their
house, and the "room" was the special pride of Nellie, who was gradually
"getting a bit thing for it" just as her means permitted. They had two
beds in each apartment, and the room was furnished. Mrs. Sinclair had
long set her mind upon a "chest of drawers," and now that that
particular piece of furniture stood proudly in her room, much of her day
was given to polishing it and the half-dozen stuffed bottomed chairs,
which were the envy of every housewife in the village. A large oval
mirror stood upon the top of the drawers, and was draped with a piece of
cheap curtain cloth, bleached to the whiteness of new fallen snow.
This mirror was a much-prized possession, for no other like it had ever
been known in the village. The floor was covered with oilcloth, and a
sheepskin rug lay upon the hearthstone, while white starched curtains
draped the window. The getting of the waxcloth had been a wonderful
event, and dozens of women had come from all over the village to stand
in gaping admiration of its beauty. This was always where Mrs. Sinclair
felt a thrill of great pride.
"Ye see," she would explain, "it's awfu' easy to wash, and a bit wipe
owre wi' soap an' watter is a' it needs."
"My, how weel aff ye are!" one woman would exclaim, "I'm telt that ye
maunna use a scrubbin' brush on't, or the pattern will rub off."
"Oh, ay," Nellie would laugh with a hint of superior wisdom in it.
"Ye'll soon waste it gin ye took a scrubber to it. An' ye maunna use
owre hot water to it either," she would add.
"Oh my!" would come in genuine surprise. "Do you tell me that. Eh, but
you're the weel-aff woman now, to hae a room like that, an' rale
waxcloth on the floor!"
"I thocht it was a fine, cheerie bit thing," Nellie would say. "It mak's
the hoose ever so much mair heartsome."
"So it is," would come the reply. "It's a fine, but cheerie thing.
You're a rale weel-aff woman, I can tell ye," and the woman would go
home to dream of one day having a room like Mrs. Sinclair's, and to tell
her neighbors of the great "grandeur" that the Sinclair's possessed,
whilst Nellie would set to, and rub and polish those drawers and that
mirror, and the stuff-bottomed chairs till they shone like the sun upon
a moorland tarn, and she herself felt like dropping from sheer
exhaustion.
She even took to telling the neighbors sometimes, when they came on
those visits that "working folk should a' hae coal-houses, for coal kept
ablow the beds makes an awfu' mess o' the ticks."
"Oh, weel," would be the reply, made with the usual sigh of resignation,
"I hae had a house a gey lang while now, an' I dinna think I've ever
wanted ony sic newfangled things as that."
"That's what's wrang," Mrs. Sinclair would reply. "We dinna want them.
If we did, we'd soon get them. What way would the gentry hae a' thae
things, an' us hae nane?"
"That's a' richt, Nellie," would be the reply. "We wadna ken what to do
wi' what the gentry has got. They're rich an' can afford it, an' forby
they need them an' we don't. I think I'm fine as I am."
"Fine as ye are!" with bitter scorn in her tones. "Ye'll never be fine
wi' a mind like that."
"Wheesht, woman Nellie! You're no feart. Dinna talk like that. We micht
a' be strucken doon dead!"
This usually ended the discussion, for Scots people generally--and the
workers especially--are always on very intimate terms with the Deity,
and know the pains and penalties of too intimate allusions to His power.
Yet, with all her discontent, Mrs. Sinclair found life very much easier
than it had been, for now that she had some of the boys started to work,
she had made her house "respectable," and added many little comforts,
besides having a "bit pound or twa lyin' in the store." So she looked
ahead with more hope and a more serene heart. Her children were well-fed
and clothed, and the old days of hunger and struggling were over, she
thought. Geordie was now taking a day off in the middle of the week to
rest, as there was no need for him to slave and toil every day as he had
done in the past. After all it would only be a very few years till he
would no longer be able to work at all.
Rosy looked the future then, as Mrs. Sinclair, on the day on which young
Robert went down the pit, showed off her room "grandeur" to an admiring
neighbor.
"My, what braw paper ye hae, Nellie. Wha put it on for ye? Was it
yirsel'?" asked the visitor with breath bated in admiration.
"Ay, it was that. I just got the chance o' the bargain, an' I thocht I'd
tak' it," she replied, with subdued pride.
"Oh, my! it's awful braw, an' sae weel matched too! I never saw anything
sae well done. You're rale weel-off, do ye ken."
"My God! What's wrang?" cried Nellie suddenly, gazing from the window
with blanched cheeks.
"I doot there's been an accident. I heard the bell gang for men three
tows a' rinnin', an' I see a lot o' men comin' up the brae. I doot the
pit's lowsed."
Both of them hurried to the door, and found that already a crowd of
women had flocked to the end of the row, and were standing waiting
anxiously on the men, in order to learn what had happened. They did not
talk, but gazed down the hill, each heart anxious to know if the
unfortunate one belonged to her. The sickening fear which grips the
heart of every miner's wife, when she sees that procession from the pit
before the proper quitting hour, lay heavy upon each one. The white
drawn faces, the set firm lips, and the deep troubled breathing told how
much the women were moved.
Wives and mothers, sweethearts and sisters, oh, what a hell of torture
they suffered in those few tense moments whilst waiting for the news,
which, though to a great extent it may relieve many, must break at least
one heart. No man, having once seen this, ever wants to witness it
again. Concentrated hell and torture with every moment, stabbing and
pulling at each heart and then--then the sad, mournful face of Andrew
Marshall as he steps forward slowly past Mag Robertson, past Jean
Fleming, past Jenny Maitland, past them all, and at last putting a
kindly hand on the shoulder of Nellie Sinclair, he says, with a catch in
his voice that would break a heart of granite: "Come awa' hame, Nellie.
Come awa' hame. Ye'll need to bear up."
Then it is whispered round: "It's Geordie Sinclair killed wi' a fa'."
And hope has died, and dreams have fled, and the world will never again
look bonnie and fresh and sweet and full of happiness, nor the blood
dance so joyously, nor the eyes ever again sparkle with the same soft
loving glance.
No more happy evenings, such as the night before had been, when the
glamor and romance of courtship days had come back, and they had found a
new beauty of love and the glory of life, in the easier circumstances
and rosy hopes ahead.
Misery and suffering, and the long keen pain, the sad cheerless
prospect, and over all the empty life and the broken heart.
Lowwood was plunged into gloom when the news of the accident was known,
and every heart went out in sympathy to Nellie Sinclair and her young
family. It was indeed a terrible blow to lose at one and the same time
her husband and her eldest boy.
It was two days later, and the bodies had not yet been recovered. Men
toiled night and day, working as only miners fighting for life can work,
risking life among the continually falling débris to recover all that
remained of their comrades.
"It couldna ha'e been worse," said Jenny Maitland sorrowfully to her
next door neighbor. "It's an awfu' blow."
"Ay," rejoined her neighbor, applying the corner of her apron to her
eyes. "It mak's it worse them no' bein' gotten yet. I think I'd gae
wrang in the mind if that happened to our yin," and then, completely
overcome, she sat down on the doorstep and sobbed in real sorrow.
"I suppose it's an awfu' big fall. He had been workin' on the top o'
some auld workin's, an' I suppose they wadna ken, an' it fell in. It
maun hae been an awfu' trial for wee Rob, poor wee man. His first day in
the pit, an' his father an' brither killed afore his een!"
"Hoo has Nellie taken it, Jenny?" enquired the neighbor, after a little,
when her sobs had subsided.
"Ye'd break yir heart if ye could see her," replied Jenny sorrowfully.
"I gaed owre when oor yin gaed out wi' the pieces--he cam' hame at fower
o'clock to get mair pieces, for they're goin' to work on to ten the
nicht--an' I never saw onything sae sad-lookin' as her face. She has
never cried the least thing yet. Never a tear has come frae her, but
she'd be better if she could greet."
"Do ye tell me that! Puir Nellie! It's an awfu' hand fu' she is left
wi', too," commented the neighbor.
"Ay, she jist looks at ye sae sad-like wi' her big black een; never a
word nor a tear, but just stares, an' she's that thin an' white lookin'.
I look for her breakin' doon a'thegither, an' when she does I wadna like
to see her. The bits o' weans gang aboot the hoose wonderin' at her, and
she looks to them too, but ye'd think she'd nae interest in onything.
She jist looks out o' the window an' doon the brae to the pit. It's
awesome to look at her."
"Oh, puir body!" and again the kindly neighbor was overcome, and Jenny
joined her tears too in silent sympathy.
"The minister was owre last nicht," said Jenny after a little, "but I
dinna think she ever spoke to him. He cam' in just when I was comin'
oot, an' I dinna like to leave her. He talked away a wee while an' then
put up a prayer; but there was nae consolation in't for onybody. I think
the sicht o' her face maun hae been too muckle for him. He didna stay
very lang, and gaed awa' saying he'd come back again. Nellie has
everything ready--the bed a' made, wi' clean sheets an' blankets on
them--an' there she stan's always at that window, lookin' doon the brae.
It would break yer heart to see her, Leezie, she's that vexed lookin'."
So they wept and sorrowed together.
* * * * *
Down in the pit, Andrew Marshall, Matthew Maitland, Peter Pegg, and a
number of others toiled like giants possessed. Their naked bodies
streamed with sweat and glistened in the light of their lamps. Timber
was placed in position, and driven tight with desperation in every blow
from their hammers; blocks of rock were tossed aside, and smashed into
fragments, ere being filled into the tubs which were ever waiting ready
to convey the débris to the pit-head. Few words were spoken, except when
a warning shout was given, when some loose rubble poured down from the
great gaping cavern in the roof, and then men jumped and sprang to
safety with the agility of desperation, to wait till the rumbling had
ceased, only to leap back again into the yawning hell, tearing at the
stones, and trying to work their way into the place where they knew
Geordie and the boy were lying. It seemed impossible that human efforts
would ever be able to clear that mountain away.
"Wait a minute, callans," said Andrew, almost dropping with exhaustion,
and drawing his hands across his eyes to wipe the sweat from them,
whilst he "hunkered" down, his back against a broken tree which stood
jutting out from the building, supporting a broken "baton" (cross-tree),
which bent down in the center, making the roadway low and unsafe. "Let
us tak a minute's thocht, and see if we can get a way o' chokin' up that
stuff fear fallin' doon. We'll never get it redd up goin' like this."
So they sat down, tired but still desperate, to listen to each one
suggesting a way of stopping the débris from continuing to fall. Baffled
and at their wits' end, they could think of nothing.
At last in came a number of other men to relieve them--men equally
anxious and desperate as they, burning with the desire to get to grips
with this calamity which had come upon two of their comrades.
"I'm no' goin' hame," said Andrew decisively, "till I see Geordie out."
He was almost dropping with exhaustion, but he could not think of
leaving his dead friend in there. So at last it was agreed that he
should stay, and at least give the benefit of his advice. The others,
more tired than ever they had been before in all their experience of the
mines, where hard work is the rule, trudged wearily home, to be met by
the waiting groups of women and children, who at all times stood at the
corners of the village eagerly asking for news, "If they'd been gotten
yet."
After a few minutes' deliberation a plan was decided on by Andrew and
his comrades of trying to choke up the hole in the roof with timber, and
the work went on desperately, silently, heroically. Time and again their
efforts were baffled by new falls, but always the same persistent eager
spirit drove them back to their toil. So they worked, risking and daring
things of which no man who never saw a like calamity has any conception,
and which would have appalled themselves at any other time.
"Look out, boys," called Tam Donaldson, springing back to the road as
the warning noise again began, and great masses of rock came hurtling
down, filling the place with dust and noise.
A cry of pain and horror broke upon them as they ran, and brought them
back while the crumbling mass was still falling.
"Great God! It's wee Jamie Allan," roared one man above the din. "He's
catched by the leg! Here, boys, hurry up! Try an' get this block broken
afore ony mair comes doon. God Almichty! Are we a' goin' to be buried
thegither? This bit, boys! Quick!" And they tore at the great masses of
stone, the sweat streaming from every pore of their bodies, cursing
their impotence as they smashed with big hammers the rock which lay upon
Jamie's leg.
"Mind yersel's, laddies!" warned Jamie, as again the trickling noise
began, heralding another fall. "Leave me, for God's sake, an' get back!"
But not one heeded. Desperate and strong with the strength of giants,
they toiled on, the sight of suffering so manifest in Jamie's eyes, as
he strove not to cry out, spurring them onward.
"Ye'll never lift that bit, Tam," said Jamie, as four of them tore at
the block which lay upon his leg. "It's faur too big. Take an ax an'
hack the leg off. I doot it'll be wasted anyway. Oh, dear! Oh, dear!"
And unable longer to endure the pain, he roared aloud in agony, and tore
at the stone himself with his fingers, like an imprisoned beast in a
trap.
"Here, boys, quick!" cried Andrew, getting his long pinch in below the
stone, upon a fine leverage. "Put yir weight on this, Tam, an' Jock an'
Sanny'll try an' pull Jamie out. Hurry up, for she's working for anither
collapse. A'thegither!" and so they tugged and tore, and strained and
pulled, while the roars of the imprisoned man were deafening.
"A'thegither again, laddies!" encouraged Andrew. "This time!" and with a
tremendous effort the stone gave way, and Jamie was pulled clear, his
leg a crushed mass of pulpy blood and shattered bones. They dragged him
back clear of any further falls, and improvised a stretcher on which to
carry home his now unconscious body.
"That was a hell o' a narrow shave," quietly observed Tam Donaldson, as
they panted together, and tried to collect themselves. "His leg's
wasted, I doot, an' will need to come off." When they had their
stretcher ready, the wounded man was tenderly placed upon it, carefully
covered up with the jackets of the others; whilst half-a-dozen of them
carried him to the pit bottom, and finally bore him home, where the
doctor was ready waiting to attend to him.
Andrew and a few others worked away, and at last managed to get the
running sore in the roof choked up with long bars of timber, and even
though it continued to rumble away above them, the heavy blocks of wood
held, and so allowed them to work away in comparative safety.
Peter Pegg and Matthew Maitland returned at six o'clock next morning,
bringing with them another band of workers to relieve those who had
worked all night, but still Andrew Marshall would not leave the scene of
the disaster. He worked and rested by turns, advising and guiding the
younger men, who never spared themselves. They performed mighty epics of
work down there in the darkness amid the rumbling, falling roof. It was
a great task they were set, but they never shirked the consequences.
They never turned back. Risks were taken and accepted without a thought;
tasks were eagerly jumped to, and the whole job accepted as if it were
just what ordinarily they were asked to do.
Crash went the hammers; thump went the great blocks of material into the
tubs, and the men quietly got away the tubs as they were filled. Night
and day the great work went on, never ceasing, persistent, relentless.
If one man dropped out a minute to breathe and rest when exhausted,
another sprang into his place, and toiled and strove like an engine.
There was something great and inspiring even to look on at those mighty
efforts--something exhilarating and elevating in the play of muscles
like great long shooting serpents under the glistening skins of the men.
Arms shot out, tugged and tore, jerked and wrenched, then doubled up and
the muscles became knots, bulging out as if they would break through the
skin, as the great blocks were lifted; and then the blocks were cast
into the tub, the knots untied themselves, and slipped elastically back
into their places, and the serpents were momentarily at rest until the
body bent again to another block. Out and in they flew, supple and
silent, quick as lightning playing in the heavens; they zig-zagged and
shot this way and that, tying and untying themselves, darting out and
doubling back, advancing and retiring in rhythmic action, graceful and
easy, powerful and inevitable. Bending and rising, the swaying bodies
gleamed and glistened with greasy dust and sweat, catching the gleams
from the lamps and reflecting them in every streaming pore. Straining
and tearing, the muscles, at every slightest wish, seemed to exude
energy and health, glowing strength and power.
It was all so natural and apparently easy--an epic in moleskin and human
flesh, with only the little glimmer of oil-lamps, which darted from side
to side in a mad mazurka of toil, crossing and recrossing, swinging and
halting, the flames flattening out with every heave of their owners'
bodies, then abruptly being brought to the steady again. Looked at from
the road-foot, it was like a carnival of fireflies engaged in trying how
quickly they could dart from side to side, and cross each other's path,
without coming into collision.
Who shall sing in lyrical language the exhilaration of such splendid
men's work? Who shall catch that glow of strength and health, and work
it into deathless song? The ring of the hammers on the stone, the dull
regular thud upon the timber, the crash of breaking rock, and the
strong, warm-blooded, generous-hearted men; the passionate glowing
bodies, and above all, the great big heroic souls, fighting, working,
striving in a hell of hunger and death, toiling till one felt they were
gods instead of humans--gods of succor and power, gods of helpfulness
and strength.
So the work went on hour after hour, and now their efforts were
beginning to tell. No more came the rumbling, treacherous falls; but
perceptibly, irresistibly was the passage gradually cleared, and the way
opened up, until it seemed as if these men were literally eating their
way into that rock-filled passage.
"Can ye tell me where Black Jock is a' this time?" enquired Andrew, as
Peter and Matthew and he sat back the road, resting while the others
worked. "Rundell has been here twa or three times, for hours at a time,
but I hae never seen Walker yet."
"I hae never seen him either, an' I was hearin' that he was badly,"
returned Peter, and his big eye seemed to turn as if it were looking for
and expecting some one to slip up behind him.
"Ay," broke in Matthew, "badly! I wadna say, but it micht be that he's
badly; but maybe he's not."
"Do ye ken, boys," said Andrew quietly, taking his pipe out of his
mouth, and speaking with slow deliberation, "I'm beginnin' to think
Black Jock is guilty o' Geordie's death. Geordie, as we a' ken, had ay
something against Walker. There was something he kent aboot the black
brute that lately kept him gey quiet; for, if ye noticed, whenever
Geordie went to him about anybody's complaint, the men aye won. I ken
Walker hated him, an' I'm inclined to think that he has deliberately
put Geordie into this place, kennin' that the lower seam had been
worked out lang, lang syne. His plans wad tell him as muckle about the
workin's, and I ken, at least, he's never been in Geordie's place since
it was started, an' there's nae ither places drivin' up sae far as this.
They're a' stoppit afore they come this length; an' forby, frae what
Rundell has let drap the day, he never kent that the coal was being
worked as far up as this. By ----! Peter, gin I could prove what I
suspect, I'd murder the dirty brute this nicht! I would that!"
"Would Nellie no' ken, think ye, what it was that Geordie had against
Black Jock that kept him sae quiet?" enquired Peter.
"I couldna' say," answered Andrew, "but some day when I get the chance
I'll maybe ask her, an' if it is as I think, then there'll be rows."
"Let me ken, Andrew," broke in Matthew. "Let me ken if ever ye discover
onything; an' ye can count on me sharin' the penalties o' hell alang wi'
ye for the murder o' the big black brute."
"I heard," said Peter, "that he was boozin' wi' Mag Robertson and Sanny.
But we'll no' be long in kennin', for ill-doin' canna hide."
* * * * *
After three frantic days of fighting against calamity, during which
Andrew never left the fight except for that brief journey to tell Nellie
the news, at last they came upon the crushed mass of bloody pulp and
rags, smashed together so that the one could not be told from the
other--father and son, a heap of broken bones and flesh and blood....
And no pen can describe accurately the scene.
The light had gone out from one woman's heart, the hope had been crushed
from her life. The rainbow which had promised so much vanished. The lust
and urge had gone out of eager life. Never again would the world seem
fair and beautiful. Instead, all the weary fight and desperate battle
with poverty and privation over again; the dull misery and the drab
gray existence, and always the pain--the heavy, dragging pain of a
broken life. With a woman's "Oh! my God!" the world for one heart stood
still, and the blind fate of things triumphed, crushing a woman's soul
in the process.