The Jungle
another man. So he took off his coat and set to work on the spot.
It took him two hours to get to this place every day and cost him a
dollar and twenty cents a week. As this was out of the question, he
wrapped his bedding in a bundle and took it with him, and one of his
fellow workingmen introduced him to a Polish lodging-house, where he
might have the privilege of sleeping upon the floor for ten cents a
night. He got his meals at free-lunch counters, and every Saturday
night he went home—bedding and all—and took the greater part of his
money to the family. Elzbieta was sorry for this arrangement, for she
feared that it would get him into the habit of living without them, and
once a week was not very often for him to see his baby; but there was
no other way of arranging it. There was no chance for a woman at the
steelworks, and Marija was now ready for work again, and lured on from
day to day by the hope of finding it at the yards.
In a week Jurgis got over his sense of helplessness and bewilderment in
the rail mill. He learned to find his way about and to take all the
miracles and terrors for granted, to work without hearing the rumbling
and crashing. From blind fear he went to the other extreme; he became
reckless and indifferent, like all the rest of the men, who took but
little thought of themselves in the ardor of their work. It was
wonderful, when one came to think of it, that these men should have
taken an interest in the work they did—they had no share in it—they
were paid by the hour, and paid no more for being interested. Also they
knew that if they were hurt they would be flung aside and forgotten—and
still they would hurry to their task by dangerous short cuts, would use
methods that were quicker and more effective in spite of the fact that
they were also risky. His fourth day at his work Jurgis saw a man
stumble while running in front of a car, and have his foot mashed off,
and before he had been there three weeks he was witness of a yet more
dreadful accident. There was a row of brick furnaces, shining white
through every crack with the molten steel inside. Some of these were
bulging dangerously, yet men worked before them, wearing blue glasses
when they opened and shut the doors. One morning as Jurgis was passing,
a furnace blew out, spraying two men with a shower of liquid fire. As
they lay screaming and rolling upon the ground in agony, Jurgis rushed
to help them, and as a result he lost a good part of the skin from the
inside of one of his hands. The company doctor bandaged it up, but he
got no other thanks from any one, and was laid up for eight working
days without any pay.
Most fortunately, at this juncture, Elzbieta got the long-awaited
chance to go at five o’clock in the morning and help scrub the office
floors of one of the packers. Jurgis came home and covered himself with
blankets to keep warm, and divided his time between sleeping and
playing with little Antanas. Juozapas was away raking in the dump a
good part of the time, and Elzbieta and Marija were hunting for more
work.
Antanas was now over a year and a half old, and was a perfect talking
machine. He learned so fast that every week when Jurgis came home it
seemed to him as if he had a new child. He would sit down and listen
and stare at him, and give vent to delighted exclamations—“_Palauk!
Muma! Tu mano szirdele!_” The little fellow was now really the one
delight that Jurgis had in the world—his one hope, his one victory.
Thank God, Antanas was a boy! And he was as tough as a pine knot, and
with the appetite of a wolf. Nothing had hurt him, and nothing could
hurt him; he had come through all the suffering and deprivation
unscathed—only shriller-voiced and more determined in his grip upon
life. He was a terrible child to manage, was Antanas, but his father
did not mind that—he would watch him and smile to himself with
satisfaction. The more of a fighter he was the better—he would need to
fight before he got through.
Jurgis had got the habit of buying the Sunday paper whenever he had the
money; a most wonderful paper could be had for only five cents, a whole
armful, with all the news of the world set forth in big headlines, that
Jurgis could spell out slowly, with the children to help him at the
long words. There was battle and murder and sudden death—it was
marvelous how they ever heard about so many entertaining and thrilling
happenings; the stories must be all true, for surely no man could have
made such things up, and besides, there were pictures of them all, as
real as life. One of these papers was as good as a circus, and nearly
as good as a spree—certainly a most wonderful treat for a workingman,
who was tired out and stupefied, and had never had any education, and
whose work was one dull, sordid grind, day after day, and year after
year, with never a sight of a green field nor an hour’s entertainment,
nor anything but liquor to stimulate his imagination. Among other
things, these papers had pages full of comical pictures, and these were
the main joy in life to little Antanas. He treasured them up, and would
drag them out and make his father tell him about them; there were all
sorts of animals among them, and Antanas could tell the names of all of
them, lying upon the floor for hours and pointing them out with his
chubby little fingers. Whenever the story was plain enough for Jurgis
to make out, Antanas would have it repeated to him, and then he would
remember it, prattling funny little sentences and mixing it up with
other stories in an irresistible fashion. Also his quaint pronunciation
of words was such a delight—and the phrases he would pick up and
remember, the most outlandish and impossible things! The first time
that the little rascal burst out with “God damn,” his father nearly
rolled off the chair with glee; but in the end he was sorry for this,
for Antanas was soon “God-damning” everything and everybody.
And then, when he was able to use his hands, Jurgis took his bedding
again and went back to his task of shifting rails. It was now April,
and the snow had given place to cold rains, and the unpaved street in
front of Aniele’s house was turned into a canal. Jurgis would have to
wade through it to get home, and if it was late he might easily get
stuck to his waist in the mire. But he did not mind this much—it was a
promise that summer was coming. Marija had now gotten a place as
beef-trimmer in one of the smaller packing plants; and he told himself
that he had learned his lesson now, and would meet with no more
accidents—so that at last there was prospect of an end to their long
agony. They could save money again, and when another winter came they
would have a comfortable place; and the children would be off the
streets and in school again, and they might set to work to nurse back
into life their habits of decency and kindness. So once more Jurgis
began to make plans and dream dreams.
And then one Saturday night he jumped off the car and started home,
with the sun shining low under the edge of a bank of clouds that had
been pouring floods of water into the mud-soaked street. There was a
rainbow in the sky, and another in his breast—for he had thirty-six
hours’ rest before him, and a chance to see his family. Then suddenly
he came in sight of the house, and noticed that there was a crowd
before the door. He ran up the steps and pushed his way in, and saw
Aniele’s kitchen crowded with excited women. It reminded him so vividly
of the time when he had come home from jail and found Ona dying, that
his heart almost stood still. “What’s the matter?” he cried.
A dead silence had fallen in the room, and he saw that every one was
staring at him. “What’s the matter?” he exclaimed again.
And then, up in the garret, he heard sounds of wailing, in Marija’s
voice. He started for the ladder—and Aniele seized him by the arm. “No,
no!” she exclaimed. “Don’t go up there!”
“What is it?” he shouted.
And the old woman answered him weakly: “It’s Antanas. He’s dead. He was
drowned out in the street!”
CHAPTER XXII
Jurgis took the news in a peculiar way. He turned deadly pale, but he
caught himself, and for half a minute stood in the middle of the room,
clenching his hands tightly and setting his teeth. Then he pushed
Aniele aside and strode into the next room and climbed the ladder.
In the corner was a blanket, with a form half showing beneath it; and
beside it lay Elzbieta, whether crying or in a faint, Jurgis could not
tell. Marija was pacing the room, screaming and wringing her hands. He
clenched his hands tighter yet, and his voice was hard as he spoke.
“How did it happen?” he asked.
Marija scarcely heard him in her agony. He repeated the question,
louder and yet more harshly. “He fell off the sidewalk!” she wailed.
The sidewalk in front of the house was a platform made of half-rotten
boards, about five feet above the level of the sunken street.
“How did he come to be there?” he demanded.
“He went—he went out to play,” Marija sobbed, her voice choking her.
“We couldn’t make him stay in. He must have got caught in the mud!”
“Are you sure that he is dead?” he demanded.
“Ai! ai!” she wailed. “Yes; we had the doctor.”
Then Jurgis stood a few seconds, wavering. He did not shed a tear. He
took one glance more at the blanket with the little form beneath it,
and then turned suddenly to the ladder and climbed down again. A
silence fell once more in the room as he entered. He went straight to
the door, passed out, and started down the street.
When his wife had died, Jurgis made for the nearest saloon, but he did
not do that now, though he had his week’s wages in his pocket. He
walked and walked, seeing nothing, splashing through mud and water.
Later on he sat down upon a step and hid his face in his hands and for
half an hour or so he did not move. Now and then he would whisper to
himself: “Dead! _Dead!_”
Finally, he got up and walked on again. It was about sunset, and he
went on and on until it was dark, when he was stopped by a railroad
crossing. The gates were down, and a long train of freight cars was
thundering by. He stood and watched it; and all at once a wild impulse
seized him, a thought that had been lurking within him, unspoken,
unrecognized, leaped into sudden life. He started down the track, and
when he was past the gate-keeper’s shanty he sprang forward and swung
himself on to one of the cars.
By and by the train stopped again, and Jurgis sprang down and ran under
the car, and hid himself upon the truck. Here he sat, and when the
train started again, he fought a battle with his soul. He gripped his
hands and set his teeth together—he had not wept, and he would not—not
a tear! It was past and over, and he was done with it—he would fling it
off his shoulders, be free of it, the whole business, that night. It
should go like a black, hateful nightmare, and in the morning he would
be a new man. And every time that a thought of it assailed him—a tender
memory, a trace of a tear—he rose up, cursing with rage, and pounded it
down.
He was fighting for his life; he gnashed his teeth together in his
desperation. He had been a fool, a fool! He had wasted his life, he had
wrecked himself, with his accursed weakness; and now he was done with
it—he would tear it out of him, root and branch! There should be no
more tears and no more tenderness; he had had enough of them—they had
sold him into slavery! Now he was going to be free, to tear off his
shackles, to rise up and fight. He was glad that the end had come—it
had to come some time, and it was just as well now. This was no world
for women and children, and the sooner they got out of it the better
for them. Whatever Antanas might suffer where he was, he could suffer