Chapter 56

OATHS.

As soon as Peter was on the express he went into the smoking cabin of the sleeping-car, and lighting a cigar, took out a letter and read it over again. While he was still reading it, a voice exclaimed:

“Good! Here’s Peter. So you are in it too?” Ogden continued, as Ray and he took seats by Peter.

“I always did despise Anarchists and Nihilists,” sighed Ray, “since I was trapped into reading some of those maudlin Russian novels, with their eighth-century ideas grafted on nineteenth-century conditions. Baby brains stimulated with whisky.”

Ogden turned to Peter. “How serious is it likely to be, Colonel?”

“I haven’t any idea,” replied Peter, “The staff is of the opposite party now, and I only have a formal notification to hold my regiment in readiness. If it’s nothing but this Socialist and Anarchist talk, there is no real danger in it.”

“Why not?”

“This country can never be in danger from discontent with our government, for it’s what the majority want it to be, or if not, it is made so at the next election. That is the beauty of a Democracy. The majority always supports the government. We fight our revolutions with ballots, not with bullets.”

“Yet Most says that blood must be shed.”

“I suppose,” said Peter, “that he has just reached the stage of intelligence which doctors had attained when they bled people to make them strong.”

“What can you do with such a fellow’s talk? You can’t argue with him,” said Ogden.

“Talk!” muttered Ray, “Don’t dignify it with that word. Gibberish!”

“No?” said Peter, “It’s too earnest to deserve that name. The man can’t express himself, but way down underneath all the absurd talk of ‘natural monopolies,’ and of ‘the oppression of the money-power,’ there lies a germ of truth, without which none of their theories would have a corporal’s guard of honest believers. We have been working towards that truth in an unsystematic way for centuries, but we are a long way from it, and till we solve how to realize it, we shall have ineffectual discontent.”

“But that makes the whole thing only the more arrant nonsense,” grumbled Ray. “It’s foolish enough in all conscience sake, if they had a chance of success, but when they haven’t any, why the deuce do they want to drag us poor beggars back from Newport?”

“Why did Rome insist on burning while Nero fiddled?” queried Peter smiling. “We should hear nothing of socialism and anarchy if Newport and the like had no existence.”

“I believe at heart you’re a Socialist yourself,” cried Ray.

“No danger,” laughed Ogden; “his bank account is too large. No man with Peter’s money is ever a Socialist”

“You forget,” said Ray, “that Peter is always an exception to the rule.”

“No,” said Peter. “I disagree with Socialists entirely both in aims and methods, but I sympathize with them, for I see the fearful problems which they think their theories will solve, and though I know how mistaken they are, I cannot blame them, when I see how seriously and honestly they believe in, and how unselfishly they work for, their ideas. Don’t blame the Socialists, for they are quite as conscientious as were the Abolitionists. Blame it to the lack of scientific education, which leaves these people to believe that theories containing a half truth are so wholly true that they mean the regeneration and salvation of society.”

“I suppose you are right,” sighed Ray, “for you’ve thought of it, and I haven’t. I don’t want to, either. I thank the Lord I’m not as serious as you, Graveyard. But if you want to air your theory, I’ll lend you my ears, for friendship’s sake. I don’t promise to remember.”

Peter puffed his cigar for a moment “I sometimes conclude,” he said, “that the people who are most in need of education, are the college-bred men. They seem to think they’ve done all the work and study of their life in their four years, and so can dissipate mentally ever after.” But Peter smiled as he said this and continued, more seriously: “Society and personal freedom are only possible in conjunction, when law or public opinion interferes to the degree of repressing all individual acts that interfere with the freedom of others; thus securing the greatest individual freedom to all. So far as physical force is concerned, we have pretty well realized this condition. Because a man is strong he can no longer take advantage of the weak. But strength is not limited to muscle. To protect the weak mind from the strong mind is an equal duty, and a far more difficult task. So far we have only partially succeeded. In this difficulty lies the whole problem. Socialism, so far as it attempts to repress individualism, and reduce mankind to an evenness opposed to all natural laws, is suicidal of the best in favor of mediocrity. But so far as it attempts to protect that mediocrity and weakness from the superior minds of the best, it is only in line with the laws which protect us from murder and robbery. You can’t expect men of the Most variety, however, to draw such distinctions.”

“I do wish they would settle it, without troubling me,” groaned Ray. “Lispenard’s right. A man’s a fool who votes, or serves on a jury, or joins a regiment. What’s the good of being a good citizen, when the other fellow won’t be? I’m sick of being good for nothing.”

“Have you just discovered that?” laughed Ogden. “You’re progressing.”

“No,” said Ray, “I am good for one thing. Like a good many other men I furnish the raw material on which the dearest of women may lavish her affection. Heigh-ho! I wish I was before the fire with her now. It’s rather rough to have visits to one’s wife cut short in this way.”

Peter rose. “I am going to get some sleep, for we don’t know what’s before us, and may not have much after to-night. But, Ray, there’s a harder thing than leaving one’s wife at such a time.”

“What’s that, Peter?” asked Ray, looking at Peter with surprise.

“To know that there is no one to whom your going or return really matters.” Peter passed out of the cabin.

“By George!” said Ray, “if it wasn’t Peter, I’d have sworn there was salt water in his eyes.”

“Anneke has always insisted that he was lonely. I wonder if she’s right?” Ogden queried.

“If he is, why the deuce does he get off in those solitary quarters of his?”

“Ray,” said Ogden, “I have a sovereign contempt for a man who answers one question with another.”

Peter reached the city at six the next morning, and, despite the hour, began his work at once. He made a number of calls in the district, holding whispered dialogues with men; who, as soon as Peter was gone, hurried about and held similar conversations with other men; who promptly went and did the same to still others. While they were doing this, Peter drove uptown, and went into Dickel’s riding academy. As he passed through the office, a man came out.

“Ah, Mr. Stirling. Good-morning.”

“Good-morning, Mr. Byrnes,” said Peter. “How serious is it likely to be?”

“We can’t say yet. But the force has all it can do now to handle the Anarchists and unemployed, and if this strike takes place we shall need you.”

Peter passed into another room where were eight men.

“Good-morning, Colonel,” said one. “You are prompt.”

“What is the trouble?”

“The Central has decided to make a general reduction. They put it in force at noon to-day, and are so certain that the men will go out, that they’ve six hundred new hands ready somewhere to put right in.”

“Byrnes tells me he has all he can do.”

“Yes. We’ve obtained the governor’s consent to embody eight regiments. It isn’t only the strike that’s serious, but this parade of the unemployed to-morrow, and the meeting which the Anarchists have called in the City Hall. Byrnes reports a very ugly feeling, and buying of arms.”

“It’s rather rough on you, Stirling,” spoke up a man, “to have it come while you are a nominee.”

Peter smiled, and passed into the room beyond. “Good-morning, General Canfield,” he said. “I have taken the necessary steps to embody my regiment. Are there any further orders?”

“If we need you, we shall put you at the Central Station,” the officer replied; “so, if you do not know the lay of the land, you had better familiarize yourself at once.”

“General Canfield,” said Peter, “my regiment has probably more sympathizers with the strikers than has any other in the city. It could not be put in a worse place.”

“Are you objecting to orders?” said the man, in a sharp decisive voice.

“No,” replied Peter. “I am stating a fact, in hopes that it may prevent trouble.”

The man and Peter looked each other in the eye.

“You have your orders,” said the man, but he didn’t look pleased or proud.

Peter turned and left the room, looking very grave. He look his cab and went to his quarters. He ate a hurried breakfast, and then went down into the streets. They seemed peaceably active as he walked through them. A small boy was calling an extra, but it was in reference to the arrival of a much-expected racing-yacht. There was nothing to show that a great business depression rested with crushing weight on the city, and especially on the poor; that anarchy was lifting its head, and from hungering for bread was coming to hunger for blood and blaze; that capital and labor were preparing to lock arms in a struggle which perhaps meant death and destruction.

The armory door was opened only wide enough to let a man squeeze through, and was guarded by a keeper. Peter passed in, however, without question, and heard a hum of voices which showed that if anarchy was gathering, so too was order. Peter called his officers together, and gave a few orders. Then he turned and whispered for a moment with Dennis.

“They don’t put us there, sir!” exclaimed Dennis.

“Yes.”

“Are they mad?”

“They’ve given us the worst job, not merely as a job, but especially for the regiment. Perhaps they won’t mind if things do go wrong.”

“Yez mean?”

“What will people say of me on November fourth, if my regiment flunks on September thirtieth?”

“Arrah musha dillah!” cried Dennis. “An’ is that it?”

“I’m afraid so. Will the men stand by me?”

“Oi’ll make them. Yez see,” shouted Dennis, “Oi’ll tell the b’ys they are tryin’ to put yez in a hole, an’ they’ll stan’ by yez, no matter what yez are told to do.”

As quickly as possible Peter put on his fatigue uniform. When he came out, it was to find that the rank and file had done the same, and were now standing in groups about the floor. A moment later they were lined up.

Peter stepped forward and said in a clear, ringing voice: “Before the roll is called I wish to say a word. We may receive orders any moment to take possession of the buildings and switches at the Central Station, to protect the property and operators of that road. This will be hard to some of you, who believe the strikers are right. But we have nothing to do with that. We have taken our oath to preserve order and law, and we are interested in having it done, far more than is the capitalist, for he can buy protection, whether laws are enforced or not, while the laboring man cannot. But if any man here is not prepared to support the State in its duty to protect the life and property of all, by an enforcement of the laws, I wish to know it now.”

Peter stood a moment waiting, and then said, “Thank you, men.”

The roll-call was made, and Peter sent off a line to headquarters, stating that his regiment, with only eighteen reported “missing” was mustered and ready for further orders. Then the regiment broke ranks, and waited.

Just as two o’clock struck a despatch was handed Peter. A moment later came the rap of the drum, and the men rose from the floor and fell in. A few sharp, quick words were passed from mouth to mouth. Guns rose to the shoulders with a click and a movement almost mechanical. The regiment swung from a long straight line into companies, the door rolled open, and without a sound, except the monotonous pound of the regular tread, the regiment passed into the street. At the corner they turned sharply, and marched up a side street, so narrow that the ranks had to break their lines to get within the curbs. So without sound of drum or music they passed through street after street. A regiment is thrilling when it parades to music: it is more so when it marches in silence.

Presently it passed into a long tunnel, where the footfall echoed in a startling way. But as it neared the other end, a more startling sound could be heard. It was a low murmur, as of many voices, and of voices that were not pleasant. Peter’s wisdom in availing himself of the protection and secrecy of the tunnel as an approach became obvious.

A moment later, as the regiment debouched from the tunnel’s mouth, the scene broke upon them. A vast crowd filled Fourth Avenue and Forty-second Street. Filled even the cut of the entrance to the tunnel. An angry crowd, judging from the sounds.

A sharp order passed down the ranks, and the many broad lines melted into a long-thin one again, even as the regiment went forward. It was greeted with yells, and bottles and bricks were hurled from above it, but the appearance of the regiment had taken the men too much by surprise for them to do more. The head entered the mob, and seemed to disappear. More and more of the regiment was swallowed up. Finally, except to those who could trace the bright glint of the rifle-barrels, it seemed to have been submerged. Then even the rifles disappeared. The regiment had passed through the crowd, and was within the station. Peter breathed a sigh of relief. To march up Fifth Avenue, with empty guns, in a parade, between ten thousand admiring spectators is one thing. To march between ten thousand angry strikers and their sympathizers, with ball cartridges in the rifles, is quite another. It is all the difference between smoking a cigar after dinner, and smoking one in a powder magazine.

The regiment’s task had only just begun, however. Peter had orders to clear the streets about the station. After a consultation with the police captain, the companies were told off, and filing out of the various doors, they began work. Peter had planned his debouchments so as to split the mob into sections, knowing that each fragment pushed back rendered the remainder less formidable. First a sally was made from the terminal station, and after two lines of troops had been thrown across Forty-second Street, the second was ordered to advance. Thus a great tongue of the mob, which stretched towards Third Avenue, was pressed back, almost to that street, and held there, without a quarter of the mob knowing that anything was being done. Then a similar operation was repeated on Forty-third Street and Forty-fourth Street, and possession was taken of Madison Avenue. Another wedge was driven into the mob and a section pushed along Forty-second, nearly to Fifth Avenue. Then what was left of the mob was pushed back from the front of the building down Park Avenue. Again Peter breathed more freely.

“I think the worst is done,” he told his officers. “Fortunately the crowd did not expect us, and was not prepared to resist. If you can once split a mob, so that it has no centre, and can’t get together again, except by going round the block, you’ve taken the heart out of it”

As he said this a soldier came up, and saluting, said: “Captain Moriarty orders me to inform you that a committee of the strikers ask to see you, Colonel.”

Peter followed the messenger. He found a couple of sentries marking a line. On one side of this line sat or reclined Company D. and eight policemen. On the other stood a group of a dozen men, and back of them, the crowd.

Peter passed the sentry line, and went up to the group. Three were the committee. The rest were the ubiquitous reporters. From the newspaper report of one of the latter We quote the rest:

“You wish to see me?” asked Colonel Stirling.

“Yes, Colonel,” said Chief Potter. “We are here to remonstrate with you.”

“We’ve done nothing yet,” said Doggett, “and till we had, the troops oughtn’t to have been called in.”

“And now people say that the scabs are to be given a regimental escort to the depot, and will go to work at eight.”

“We’ve been quiet till now,” growled a man in the crowd surlily, “but we won’t stand the militia protecting the scabs and rats.”

“Are you going to fight for the capitalist?” ask Kurfeldt, when Colonel Stirling stood silent.

“I am fighting no man’s battle, Kurfeldt,” replied Colonel Stirling. “I am obeying orders.”

The committee began to look anxious.

“You’re no friend of the poor man, and you needn’t pose any more,” shouted one of the crowd.

“Shut your mouth,” said Kurfeldt to the crowd. “Colonel Stirling,” he continued, “we know you’re our friend. But you can’t stay so if you fight labor. Take your choice. Be the rich man’s servant, or our friend.”

“I know neither rich man nor poor man in this,” Colonel Stirling said. “I know only the law.”

“You’ll let the scabs go on?”

“I know no such class. If I find any man doing what the law allows him to do, I shall not interfere. But I shall preserve order.”

“Will you order your men to fire on us?”

“If you break the laws.”

“Do it at your peril,” cried Potter angrily. “For every shot your regiment fires, you’ll lose a thousand votes on election day.”

Colonel Stirling turned on him, his face blazing with scorn. “Votes,” he cried. “Do you think I would weigh votes at such a time? There is no sacrifice I would not make, rather than give the order that ends a human life; and you think that paper ballots can influence my action? Votes compared to men’s lives!”

“Oh,” cried Doggett, “don’t come the heavy nobility racket on us. We are here for business. Votes is votes, and you needn’t pretend you don’t think so.”

Colonel Stirling was silent for a moment. Then he said calmly: “I am here to do my duty, not to win votes. There are not votes enough in this country to make me do more or less.”

“Hear him talk,” jeered one of the crowd, “and he touting round the saloons to get votes.”

The crowd jeered and hissed unpleasantly.

“Come, Colonel,” said Kurfeldt, “we know you’re after votes this year, and know too much to drive them away. You ain’t goin’ to lose fifty thousand votes, helpin’ scabs to take the bread away from us, only to see you and your party licked.”

“No,” shouted a man in the crowd. “You don’t dare monkey with votes!”

Colonel Stirling turned and faced the crowd. “Do you want to know how much I care for votes,” he called, his head reared in the air.

“Speak up loud, sonny,” shouted a man far back in the mass, “we all want to hear.”

Colonel Stirling’s voice rang quite clear enough, “Votes be damned!” he said, and turning on his heel, strode back past the sentries. And the strikers knew the fate of their attempt to keep out the scabs. Colonel Stirling’s “damn” had damned the strike as well as the votes.

Dead silence fell on the committee and crowd. Even Company D. looked astounded. Finally, however, one of the committee said, “There’s no good wasting time here.” Then a reporter said to a confrère, “What a stunning headline that will make?” Then the Captain of Company D. got his mouth closed enough to exclaim, “Oi always thought he could swear if he tried hard. Begobs, b’ys, it’s proud av him we should be this day. Didn’t he swear strong an’ fine like? Howly hivens! it’s a delight to hear damn said like that.”

For some reason that “swear-word” pleased New York and the country generally, showing that even an oath has its purpose in this world, so long as it is properly used. Dean Swift said a lie “was too good to be lavished about.” So it is of profanity. The crowd understood Peter’s remark as they would have understood nothing else. They understood that besides those rifles and bayonets there was something else not to be trifled with. So in this case, it was not wasted.

And Mr. Bohlmann, Christian though he was, as he read his paper that evening cried, “Och! Dod Beder Stirling he always does say chust der righd ding!”