CONCLUSION
A GREAT mob was packed in Liberty Hall later in the evening. There were
no mutterings. The men were sullen and discouraged. Outside the hall was
a platoon of guardsmen ready to fall in for whatever services might be
demanded of them. The spirit of the striking men seemed to have been
broken.
Three of the six who had gone down to plant the dynamite under the
bridge had been killed by the fire of the guardsmen. Every shaft was
guarded by armed men, with orders to shoot any man who approached the
shaft after dark. The company was prepared to keep the siege up all
winter if necessary, though they promised that, were the miners to throw
out their leader and elect an honest man, the company might treat with
them, looking toward a settlement.
The chairman rose. His face was solemn, but his eyes belied the
solemnity of his face.
"My friends," he began, "the bosses have triumphed over us to-day, but
we shall down them yet. I have a piece of news for you showing the
trickery to which they have resorted. The men of the Blair Mine have
gone back to work. The bosses have done this to tantalize you."
None thought how inconsistent this was. The men began to grow noisy and
restless after this announcement.
"How do they go back?" shouted a voice.
"At the old terms," answered the chairman. "They gave it up."
"We'll keep it up! We won't give up till we starve!"
"No; down with the bosses! We should get guns and drive these troops,
these hirelings, from the range. Arm yourselves, men, and assert your
manhood!" cried another voice, that of one of the leader's lieutenants,
though he made certain that only a few of those about him observed
whence the words came.
Steve Rush and Bob Jarvis rose from the corner of the room near the
stairway unobserved. Steve jumped up on a window-sill, waving his hat to
attract their attention.
"Men, men! Listen to me!"
There was a sullen roar when the miners discovered who it was, and the
mob rose to its feet, surging toward Steve.
"Stay where you are if you value your lives. There are fifty rifles
trained on this hall at this moment. The guardsmen will riddle you with
bullets if you make a hostile move toward me."
The men hesitated.
"I am your friend, though you do not believe it. I will prove to you
that I am. Listen to me, boys. Listen! That man," pointing to Cavard,
"is a scoundrel. It is he who has led you on to this terrible strike. It
is he who is to blame for the suffering of your families. I tell you I
know this. I could prove it to you, but there are other things that you
must know first."
"Speak out. We'll hear you," cried a voice.
"I am going to do so. Your leader has just told you, almost shedding
tears as he did so, that the Blair Mine had resumed operations. But
there was something else that he did not tell you. He did not tell you
that he had had a conference with the owners of the mine, and that they
had made a deal with him. Money is what Cavard has been working
for--money and power. He's got the money now, and he doesn't care what
becomes of you----"
"It's a lie!" shrieked the man Cavard.
"It is the truth. Men, Cavard was paid fifteen thousand dollars by an
official of the Blair mine last night to call off the strike. I could
give you the official's name. That fifteen thousand dollars was
deposited in the bank here to-day. It is here, all here. I have the
proofs. He is a traitor! He has sold you out at the expense of your
families. Now, what are you going to do about it?"
With a howl of rage the men turned to the place where Cavard had been
standing. But the man was gone. He had slunk out under cover of Steve
Rush's thrilling speech never to be seen in the mining village again.
Steve had seen him go, but had not tried to detain him.
"What shall we do?" cried the men, when they discovered that their prey
had escaped them.
"Call the strike off, here and now, and go to work. After all has
quieted down again, reorganize your union if you wish, and put honest
men at the head of it. I shall be with you heart and soul, if you are
willing to do as I have suggested."
There was a moment of silence.
"Rush! Rush! Three cheers for the gamest, squarest boy on the iron
range!" shouted a miner excitedly, as he sprang to a seat, waving his
arms.
The audience rose as one man, and the building fairly trembled under
their roars. They rushed toward the Iron Boys. Bob was caught in the
crush and pushed half way down the stairs. But the men were not going to
leave just yet. They were enthusiastically shouting the name of Rush.
Steve was caught up. His hat was lost, his coat was nearly ripped from
his shoulders, and he was borne in triumph to the rostrum, where they
tossed him up into the president's chair.
"You're the next president of the miners' union," they howled.
Steve raised a protesting hand.
"No, boys; you must choose an older man than I. You need level heads
here. Besides, I may not be with you next year, but while I am here I
shall work for your good. Good luck, boys! To-morrow you will go to
work, and there will be happiness in your homes on Christmas Day."
The men had seated themselves again. But as Steve finished speaking a
giant figure rose up directly in front of the platform.
It was Segunder Olsen.
"Whoop! Y-e-o-w!" howled the giant.
The strike was ended. As soon as Steve could get away he hurried to his
room and went to bed. But his eyes were bright and his heart was full of
happiness.
On the following day he was summoned to the main office of the company,
with his companion. Each lad was handed a bank book by the president,
after the latter had expressed his appreciation of their splendid work.
The bank books showed that Steve Rush and Bob Jarvis had a thousand
dollars apiece placed to their credit in the bank.
Their work had been well done. They had done their duty, they had risked
their lives and they had won. Their patriotism for the great industrial
cause had carried them on to a triumphant success. Next season they were
to try themselves out in new fields, where they were destined to
distinguish themselves in a marked manner.
Their further experiences will be told in a following volume entitled,
"THE IRON BOYS ON THE ORE BOATS; Or, Roughing it on the Great Lakes." In
that new life the lads were destined to meet with even more thrilling
experiences than they had had during their eventful career in the mines
on the great iron range.
THE END
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Transcriber Notes:
Passages in italics were indicated by _underscores_.
Passages in bold were indicated by =equal signs=.
Small caps were replaced with ALL CAPS.
Throughout the document, the oe ligature was replaced with "oe".
Throughout the dialogues, there were words used to mimic accents of the
speakers. Those words were retained as-is.
The illustrations have been moved so that they do not break up
paragraphs and so that they are next to the text they illustrate. Thus
the page number of the illustration might not match the page number in
the List of Illustrations, and the order of illustrations may not be the
same in the List of Illustrations and in the book.
Errors in punctuations and inconsistent hyphenation were not corrected
unless otherwise noted.
On page 43, the period after "they quickly disperse" was replaced with a
question mark.
On page 65, "flattended" was replaced with "flattened".
On page 72, the period after "the first level" was replaced with a
comma.
On page 132, a quotation mark was added after "whether it will stand or
not."
On page 160, "pur-purposes" was replaced with "purposes".
On page 226, the comma after "pulling himself together" was replaced,
with a period.
On page 250, a quotation mark was added after "on Christmas Day."
End of Project Gutenberg's The Iron Boys as Foremen, by James R. Mears