The Land of Plenty, page 18
But a long time passed before MacMahon caught on. He looked at the factory in a dull and shrunken surprise. “Look,” he said. “Look.” Carl did not answer him; his mind was still trapped and darting; he did not know what to say.
8. WINTERS
HE tossed the light down to someone standing on the track. Around him the men began dropping off the deck down into the narrow canyon between the vats and the log deck. The man who received the light darted under the factory. The log had not been moved. It rested in a pit between the foundations of the deck and the track, the side toward the factory brightly lighted now with the two flashlights and the other side shadowed and steaming.
Here, someone said. Give it here.
He could see where they had tried to build up a support for the jacks to be set against, and where the supports had given way. Timbers had been set against the pilings but they were crushed and the head of the jack had buried itself in the soft bark and the wood. Now they were building up another support against the pilings under the factory. Loose timbers were being passed underneath and arranged in place.
He heard the men call to one another in sharp, absorbed cries.
Give me a hand, someone said. Here.
He dropped to the track. Gil Ahab passed him, carrying one end of a weather-beaten timber. The light from under the factory caught Gil Ahab for an instant and he could see his face twisted with the weight he was carrying and the effort he made to keep his balance. The timber was dropped and moved under the factory. There was a cramped stirring about as the men adjusted it in place.
The group around the log suddenly split, and Hagen crawled out of the cramped space under the factory.
He could see the hoist man still lying pressed into the ground in the narrow tunnel of light, lying on his side with his shoulder jammed up hard against his cheek, precisely as he had been before Winters ran for the light. Someone pushed him violently. Get out of the way! Another timber slid under the factory.
He stepped back. Gil Ahab stopped beside him, breathing heavily, watching the timber being slid under the factory by the men kneeling beside the foundations. When it disappeared he called out, “How many more?”
Someone close to the log crowded forward. “How many more?”
The answer from under the factory was strained and muffled. “Five—six more.”
He started off after the men who were carrying the timbers. Passing along the doors of the vats, he felt the heat that escaped around the doors and smelled the hot wood inside, a kind of medicinal smell that came from the steaming bark and sap. When they were out of the light he staggered over the rough track. He could hardly see his companions, but he could hear the rustle of their clothes and their heavy breathing. He glanced back. The kneeling figures around the log were screened by the steam that escaped from around the doors of the vats.
The timbers were being taken from a pile of refuse at the end of the row of vats. Here the darkness was complete, and as Winters felt over the pile of rubbish, searching for a piece that was substantial and that could be taken away, he heard the other men stumbling over the pile, tugging at some timber that seemed the right size, or moving the heavier pieces to free one that was caught. There was no talking. Now and then someone cursed briefly when he hurt himself or wasted his strength tugging on some piece that could not be worked free.
He groped forward unsteadily until his hands touched a timber that seemed suitable. He felt along it to find out if it was too long to go under the factory. One end was buried in a pile of heavier timbers. For a few moments he pulled at it senselessly, until a kind of red glow spread over the darkness and his hands burned from the splinters in the wood. He gave up, and leaned against the wall of the vat to get his breath. Someone said, “Here’s one. Give me a hand.” He started toward the voice, but someone else said, “I got it,” and he heard the men cautioning each other as they carried it away. Easy now, they said. Easy. All right. Watch out.
Someone shouted, Don’t bring any more! Hagen! Don’t monkey with that! Get twenty-thirty men and lift one end and block it up. Then roll it back.
He heard Frankie Dwyer yelling, Use your heads! Some of you guys go look in them cars and see if you can dig up another light!
They ran around the head end of the mill toward the office and the parking space. In the intense dark he stumbled and fell. He could hear the others running through the tall grass and the stray curses as they stumbled. The ground was cut with drainage ditches and was still damp with the seepage from the factory. As soon as he got away from the buildings he could see more clearly; the ditches and the heaps of scrap metal became great pits of shadow. A car was drawn up before the office. As he approached and his footsteps sounded on the driveway there was a stir of movement in the car; two figures separated with a violent, explosive movement.
He called out, “Have you people got a flashlight?”
There was no answer. The lights went on. In the indirect light of the dash he saw a girl sitting behind the steering wheel, looking ruffled and indignant, her head lifted up and her large chin thrust forward. On the opposite side of the seat a boy was watching him, looking scared and uncertain.
“A man’s hurt,” he said. “We need a flashlight.”
They looked at each other. The girl made a little convulsive movement and smoothed her dress around her legs. Her dress had been pulled up around her waist. He repeated that a man was hurt, but they only stared at him blankly. The boy’s light hair was ruffled and his face was flushed.
“Come on!” he said sharply. “A man’s hurt. You hear? We need a light.”
The girl straightened up obediently and the boy lifted the seat cushion. They searched among the tools and in the pockets on the doors, silently but hurriedly, occasionally glancing up to see if he was watching them. They were afraid of him. The knowledge of it surprised him. Then he saw some of the men looking into the other cars, and called to them.
“Never mind! It’ll take too long! We’ll drive this one up and use the headlights!” They came back, gathering around the car. The ambulance was coming up the road; some of the men ran out to hail it. It drew up in the parking space and two men, their white uniforms conspicuous in the dark, stepped out on the gravel.
Here! someone said. This way!
He said to the girl, “Drive on around the office. I’ll show you where to go. If you get stuck we’ll lift you out.”
She looked at him, her large face empty and dazed. The boy said, “See here.”
“Come on!” he said impatiently. “We’ll use your headlights. See? We’ll push you out if you get stuck.”
She looked at him and then at the men crowding around the car.
“We haven’t got a flashlight,” she said.
He stepped on the running-board and held the side of the car. She drew back, looking in bewilderment at the mud on his hands.
“All right,” he said. “We’re set. Go ahead.”
Walt Connor pushed his way through the men. “What’s wrong? What’s wrong, Winters? What’s the trouble?”
The girl said, “Walt! What’s the matter? Who’s hurt?”
Walt pulled at his shoulder. “Come on, Winters, what the hell’s the matter with you?”
He tried to explain. “We’ll push you out if you get stuck. You won’t have to go far. Just so your headlights reach them.” He turned to Walt. “Let go! They got to have light, you dumb bastard.”
“The ambulance is here!”
“That don’t give them any light!”
“They got two flashlights up there now.”
“Who’s hurt?” the girl said. “Walt! Who is it?”
“Look here,’’ the boy said weakly. “Listen.”
“For Christ’s sake!” Winters opened the door and pushed the girl over on the seat. The headlights spread over the waste of bunch grass. “Push me if I get stuck,” he said. The car lurched off the gravel and into the first shallow ditch. The rear wheels spun in the mud for an instant. Then they went out into open ground, and as he shifted into second he saw the men running beside the car. The boy was gripping the side of the car with both hands. His dinner jacket was pulled awkwardly around him, his high collar sank into the soft flesh under his chin. Except when he glanced at Winters, he watched the ground that opened up under the headlights, his mouth sagging open, his features frozen into an expression of alarm. He had a high forehead and a great mass of light curly hair. Whenever they approached a deeper gash in the field tense lines of anticipation crossed his forehead, his lips drew back from his teeth and his hands tightened on the side of the car. Winters thought: they’re afraid I’ll wreck it. They don’t believe I can handle it. He whipped the car around a heap of scrap iron, feeling a little thrill of pleasure that the car responded so easily, everything tight and tuned up, the control perfect, a light touch on the wheel moving at once through the whole machine. To reassure them he said, out of the side of his mouth, “I won’t hurt it. We got to have light.”
His words made them jump. They think I’m crazy, he thought, and grinned as he bore down on the gas.
The girl too was extremely nervous. She sat far forward in the seat, awkwardly, bracing herself with her hand against the dashboard when the car lurched. As the front wheels approached a drop her whole body rose and a grimace of pain and fright, almost of anguish, shot convulsively over her round features; her eyes tightened shut. When they got around the corner of the building the lights opened up a cleared space to the head end of the factory. The lights were reflected, dimly, against the log vats. When the car dropped into one of the ditches the lights danced up to the roof or toward the sky or straight at the tangled grass. A drainage ditch opened up at the far reach of the light and he stepped on it, bearing down on the gas while the girl began to scream. The drop almost threw him out of the car. The car hung suspended, weaving back and forth, the rear wheels singing against the grass and mud, until the men crowded around it, heaving until it pulled free. When he could see the men working in the space between the vats and the log deck, he stopped and switched off the motor.
“Leave it here,” he said.
He got out and sprinted toward the vats. The light was still too far away but the track and the log were clearer; the men were standing back to let the light fall full on the log. They were jacking it up slowly when he got there, thrusting the blocks under the log to save each grudging inch that it lifted. Frankie Dwyer heaved at the jack and as the head of the jack pressed against the log the sap squirted out and ran down the threaded metal.
The men were silent. Winters could hear the doors of the vats tremble under the pressure of the steam inside, the scrape of the jack, the heavy breathing of the men. The headlights did some good. It was not enough, but it was better.
Under the factory one of the men from the ambulance said, “Easy. Don’t try to pull on him.”
The log lifted slowly. The crew stood by, jamming the timbers under it to save the lift if the jack gave way.
Dwyer stood up suddenly. “That’s all,” he said. “That’s all the higher it will go.”
They crowded around. “Heave on it,” somebody said. They stood packed close together, each with one hand on the log.
“All set?” Dwyer asked. There was an answering murmur from under the factory. “Heave!” he said. “Heave!” The log lifted slightly. Winters could feel the man beside him tremble. The damp ground sank under his feet; the soft bark of the log cut his hand. He could feel the flesh on his face tighten and draw away from his mouth and eyes before the red light began to spread and blot out the uncertain light of the flashlights and the reflected light from the car.
“All right,” a voice said. “Let it drop.”
They stepped back. The hoist man was lying on the stretcher and they were moving him out from under the factory. Both his legs were crushed and covered with mud where they had been buried under the log. Easy, the men said. Easy. They brought him out; the men from the ambulance straightened and lifted the stretcher; someone grabbed a flashlight and held it on the ground before them. Then they went off toward the ambulance, the crowd moving slowly behind them.
Hagen said wearily, “Somebody help me put away these jacks.”
Winters watched the stretcher until it disappeared around the building. All at once he let down, crumpling up inside with the weight of misery he was carrying; only the effort he had been making had held him up. Unconsciously he moved toward the vats and leaned against them for support. He was sick. He breathed through his clenched teeth and the breath seemed to reach only the top part of his lungs, not to get down to the depths where the pressure was aching and intense. A hundred men were crowded into the narrow space between the vats and the platform. A dull murmur arose from them as the hoist man was carried away. The brutal images forced themselves on Winters’ memory as he waited, the full abyss of his plight opened up; in anguish he thought of them all sitting in the factory, complaining about Carl, while the hoist man had lain crushed and broken under the log, the bones of his legs slowly emerging from their sheath of flesh. In anguish he knew what was going to happen, and as surely as he knew that there was no hope for the hoist man he knew that Ann was dying, and understood what it was going to mean to him, and saw that he could not lie to himself any more. He saw her again lying in the hopeless room of the hospital, her hands clenching as the spasms of pain twisted her. No, he said, I can’t think about that; but now his memory would give him nothing but images of misery and terror, until it seemed he had lived all his life on the scene of some vast wreck that had strewn the world with its victims; now he remembered the “accidents” in the logging camps and in the mills where he had worked, the ruined bodies of cripples, the loggers whose intestines were ruptured and torn from the weights they pulled and the mad pace of their labors, the old men who had worked in the mills and now had no hands on their arms or no fingers on their hands; he remembered the times in his childhood when, in the little lumber camp in the mountains, the heart of the town stopped beating while the accident siren screamed at the mill.
From the time of his childhood these memories had been mounting up within him, but he had never been so conscious of their weight before; he had never gotten so close to the edge of horror. He could not endure it; the strength went out of him. Around him the men murmured dully and bitterly, blaming themselves for not having moved more swiftly, complaining because men had to do work that was so hazardous and could so easily be made safe. Some of them were moving back into the dark factory, silent, sickened at the accident and exhausted by the strain they had been under, by the minutes of helplessness before they could get the hoist man free. Suddenly Hagen said, in answer to some inaudible question, “I’ve seen twenty men killed since I’ve been here,” and at the sound of his voice Winters pulled himself together; he tried to grope his way back to life. I’m finished, he thought; this is my last night here, wondering dully why Carl had not already found him and told him to get his time. He tried to make himself think of leaving, of looking for a new job, of going from one place to another while Ann was dying—how would they treat her if he could not pay anything on the hospital bills? But there were no answers to those questions. As he waked up he saw that some of the men had gathered around him and in a dim way he thought they were waiting for him to tell them something, to answer the questions they had not learned to ask, but he was too sick and disheartened to speak. They waited patiently and silently and when he did not say anything they were not conscious of any disappointment; they were sorry that he would be fired; they wanted to know what to do.
Someone asked, “Who’s got a cigarette?”
Dwyer handed them around, and they smoked, standing in the steaming dark and waiting.
“I heard you konked him,” Dwyer said.
“Yeah.”
“What was the matter?”
“He wouldn’t give me the flashlight.”
“Did he see who you were?”
“Yeah.” He hesitated. “MacMahon too. He was there too.”
“What do you figure on doing?”
“I don’t know. I’m going to try to get a job on that road crew working in the mountains. If I can’t connect there I don’t know what I’ll do.”
A voice said, “They’re hiring men up there. They fire two and hire one.”
“You konked him,” Dwyer said. “Jesus.”
“Yeah.”
“Come on,” Hagen said. “Somebody give me a hand with this stuff.”
They moved reluctantly. Dwyer stepped on his cigarette. “I wish Fd seen it. I only wish I’d seen it.”
They picked up the jacks and started to carry them back to the fireroom. “Somebody bring the peavey,” Hagen said. “It won’t be here if you don’t.”
Somebody asked suddenly, “Who was that guy?”
“Who?”
“The guy who was hurt.”
“The hoist man.”
“Yeah, but what was his name?”
“I don’t know…. Frankie,” Hagen called, “what’s the hoist man’s name?”
“I don’t know. All I know is they called him Little Rock because he was born in Little Rock.”
“Little Rock,” Hagen said to the man who asked him. “Little Rock.”
9. CARL
IT WAS shadowed where he came out of the brush, and no one could see him. He took a deep breath in relief. Then he saw a group of men standing about twenty feet away from him. He did not hesitate. He hurried toward them and slapped his hands briskly. “All right, men!” he called out. As they turned toward him he said cheerfully, “We’ve got them back on! Let’s get back inside now!”
For a moment they did not move. They gaped at him. One of the men was sitting down, and he got to his feet slowly, watching Carl as he did so. “The whistle hasn’t blown!” Carl reminded them. The man nearest him gave a sickly smile and the group stirred; in the dim light he saw one of the men in back looking over his companion’s shoulder, his mouth hanging open in an idiot surprise. But Carl felt no rancor. He only wanted to get something accomplished. “We’ve had a long rest!” he reminded them. “Whistle hasn’t blown!”
