Song of the Spirits (55 page)

“Where are they supposed to go?” Timothy asked, astonished. Since the mine’s compound had been painstakingly wrested from the fern forests, the men would have to clear new land if they wanted to build a settlement outside of the compound. And if they were to do that, they would be a good distance from the mine. That was why workers were typically housed in the immediate vicinity of the mine’s entrance.

“I couldn’t care less. Anyway, I’ve had enough of those shit holes they call houses. Unbelievable that they can live like that. I’ll just come out and say it—they’re scum. They send us everything from England and Wales they can’t find a use for.”

Timothy had already heard all this the night before and had heartily reproved his father. He had, after all, just returned from England and knew that emigration from the European coal mines to New Zealand was viewed as a way to a better life. The men hoped to earn a better living there, and only the best and most entrepreneurial managed to save up for several months for the passage. They did not deserve that hell outside.

Timothy held his peace for now, however. Having that discussion again just then would not change anything. It would have to wait until his father was in a better mood.

“If it’s all right with you, I’d like to go down in the mine and have a look around,” he said in order to avoid addressing Marvin’s
grumbling. It had to be done, though one look out the window was sufficient to rob Timothy of any desire to do so. The mine entrance itself did not make a trustworthy impression. His father had not even bothered to put a roof over the washhouse, and the headframe looked rudimentary and outdated. What would it look like inside?

Marvin Lambert shrugged. “As you like. Although I remain of the opinion that you’ll be needed more in distribution and logistics than underground.”

Timothy sighed. “I’m a mining engineer, Father. I don’t know much about business.”

“You’ll learn that here real quick.” That, too, had already been discussed. Marvin thought the skills that Timothy had acquired in Europe were of limited value. He did not want an engineer as much as a capable salesman and crafty businessman. Timothy wondered why his father hadn’t had him study business instead of mining techniques. Either way, he would have refused to work as a salesman. He knew he had no natural talent for that.

Timothy tried again to make his role and his intentions clear to his father. “My job is to oversee the work in the mine and to optimize the excavation methods.”

His father frowned. “Oh?” he said, apparently taken aback. “Have they found some newfangled way to swing a pick and hammer better?”

Timothy remained calm. “There’ll be machines doing it soon enough, Father. And there are already more effective ways to ship coal and spoils now. There are more modern ways to reinforce the shafts and drill air shafts, and the whole mine drainage—”

“And in the end, that will all cost more than it brings in,” Marvin broke in. “But fine, if it makes you happy. Go have a look. Breathe in a little coal dust. You’ll have had your fill of it soon enough.”

He turned back to his papers.

Timothy said a few words in parting and left the office.

Though he was greatly interested in geology and engineering, he didn’t actually like much about the coal-mining industry. Left to his own devices, he would probably have chosen a different profession. The work underground and the many dangers associated with
it distressed him. Timothy loved to spend his time out in nature and would have preferred building houses to digging tunnels. Railroad engineering, too, appealed to him, particularly in New Zealand. But because he would someday be inheriting a mine, he had buried all personal predilections and pursued an education in mining; he’d even received a certain degree of recognition in Europe as a specialist in matters of safety. Given his great fear of mine collapses and gas explosions, his primary interest had always been in figuring out how to prevent such catastrophes. But it was the nascent, still-loose associations of coal miners who sought his expertise rather than the mine operators. The latter generally invested in the safety of their miners only after some accident had occurred, and probably more than one of those operators had breathed a sigh of relief when a scaremonger as pushy as Timothy Lambert had left their office. Let him drive up his father’s costs. Certainly none of them shed a tear when he left England.

Timothy asked the two gloomy men at the shaft winder to have the foreman sent up. He did not want to enter the shaft without a guide, and so he waited patiently until the message had been delivered. As the winder was finally set in motion, creaking and rattling, Timothy wondered, with a mild case of goose bumps, how often the cable was changed. A rather young man who spoke with a Welsh accent, the foreman appeared to be somewhat hostile toward the mine owner’s son.

“If it’s about the delivery rate again, I’ve already told your father that it can’t be increased the way we’re currently operating. I can’t work the men any faster, and it won’t do much good to get more men down there, either. They’re already stepping on each other’s feet as it is. Sometimes I’m afraid we’re going to run out of air.”

“Has no one seen to adequate ventilation?” Timothy grabbed a helmet that fit and a Davy lamp, which made him frown. More current models had been around for a while. Timothy preferred benzine
lamps. Not only did they provide light, but their aureole also revealed the amount of methane gas in the air.

The foreman noticed that Timothy seemed accustomed to being underground, and became somewhat less frosty. “We’re doing our best, sir. But air shafts don’t build themselves. To dig them, I’d have to reassign men, and then the shafts would have to be reinforced, running up material costs. Your father would give me hell for that.”

It was plenty hot. Though the day outside was rather chilly, the temperature rose as they descended in the hoisting cage. When they reached the deepest level, Timothy noted the stale air and the stifling heat.

“Dead air,” he remarked competently before greeting the men, who were pushing carts of coal to the hoisting cage in preparation for transport. “Something has to be done about that—and straightaway. It’s not even worth thinking about what would happen if gas started seeping in here.”

“That’s what he’s here for.” The foreman pointed to a cage where a tiny bird hopped dismally from one bar to another. “If that bird falls down, that’s the signal to get going.”

Timothy was horrified. “But that’s medieval! Birds are used all over the world because they can’t be beat as an early warning signal, but they’re not meant to be a replacement for adequate ventilation. I’ll speak with my father. The working conditions here have to be improved. The men will be able to dig more effectively then too.”

The foreman shook his head. “Nobody could dig more effectively. But you could spread out the supports and do a better job reinforcing them.”

“And we need to improve the spoils transportation,” Timothy said. “It can’t really be true that the men are hauling the debris away in baskets. And did I really see black powder outside? Please don’t tell me you’re not using safety explosives yet?”

The foreman replied that they were not. “We don’t even have explosion barriers. If anything goes off, the whole mine will burn.”

An hour later, Timothy had finished his inspection of the mine and had made a new friend in his foreman. Matt Gawain had attended a
coal-mining academy in Wales, and his ideas about modern extraction techniques and mine safety had a lot in common with Timothy’s. With respect to the most current ventilation techniques and shaft construction, however, Timothy was quite a bit more knowledgeable. Matt had been working in New Zealand for three years, and coal-mining techniques were constantly evolving. They made plans to meet in the pub later to continue their conversation over a beer.

“But don’t get your hopes up about making it all happen,” Matt said. “Your father is like most bosses, and only interested in fast money. Which is important, of course,” he rushed to add.

Timothy waved that off. “Thinking about the future is just as important. It costs more money if a mine collapses because no one properly secured it than to renovate at appropriate intervals. Not even to mention the cost in human lives. Besides, the union movement is on the march. Eventually, people won’t be able to avoid creating better conditions for their workers.”

Matt grinned. “At which time I have no fear that your family would be robbed of so much as a morsel of bread.”

Timothy laughed. “You’ll have to ask my father about that. He won’t waste any time telling you that he’s already ruined, and that every day a miner takes off from work brings him closer to starvation.”

He sighed with relief when the mine released him, and he saw the light of day again. His prayer of thanks to Saint Barbara had been sincere, even though he actually believed that preventing mining accidents was not the task of patron saints, but that of mining engineers.

“Where we can we wash up?” he asked.

Matt laughed. “Wash? You’ll have to go home to do that. You won’t find washrooms with ceilings or hot water around here.”

Timothy decided not to go home. On the contrary. As grimy as he was, he intended to go to his father’s office to have a very serious talk with him.

That afternoon, Timothy directed his horse toward the center of Greymouth. He wanted to order materials right away for the improvements to the mine he had wrested from his father. It was not much, however. Marvin Lambert had agreed only to the construction of a new air shaft, as well as a few explosion barriers, and he’d done even that much only to meet the minimum standards of the national mining authority. Timothy’s argument that his rival could discover and expose his safety violations—“He only needs to ask one of your miners, Father”—had convinced the old man. Timothy was determined to look over the regulations once more in detail over the next few days. Perhaps there was something else in there he could use for his purposes. But for the time being, he was enjoying the ride in the unusually pleasant spring weather. Though it had rained that morning, the sun was now shining through, and the meadows and fern forests glowed green in front of the mountain backdrop.

At the entrance to town, he passed the Methodist church, an attractive wood building. He contemplated whether he should go in and say a few words to the priest. The man was charged with the spiritual well-being of his workers after all, even if many of them were Catholic and did not attend service there. But then he saw that the pastor already seemed to have a visitor. A short and stocky white mare was tied up in front, and a three-colored collie waited patiently nearby. Just then, the church door opened. Timothy watched as the priest stepped outside to see his guest off. He held the door open for a red-haired girl with a few songbooks under her arm. An exceptionally attractive girl in a worn-out gray riding dress. She wore her long, curly hair in a braid, but a few strands had freed themselves and played about her narrow face. The priest waved amiably to his visitor as she walked over to the white horse and packed the sheet music in a saddlebag. The little dog appeared beside itself with joy at the sight of her mistress.

Timothy rode closer and greeted her. He had thought the girl had already spotted him as she left the church, but when she heard his voice, she started and spun around. For a moment, Timothy thought he detected something almost like panic in her eyes. The girl looked
around hastily like an animal caught in a trap, only calming down when Timothy made no move to leap at her. She seemed to take comfort in the proximity of the church. She tentatively returned Timothy’s smile but lowered her eyes immediately, and then limited herself to casting a few suspicious glances at him.

However, she returned his greeting in a quiet voice, climbing skillfully into the saddle as she did so. She looked like she was accustomed to mounting her horse without help.

Timothy realized they were headed the same way when the girl turned her horse toward town.

“You have a lovely horse, miss,” Timothy remarked after they had been riding beside each other for a little while. “It looks like the ponies I saw in Wales, but the bigger ones are rarely white.”