The Trainmasters (34 page)

“Sure,” she said, but she looked at Teresa. She wanted to accompany Teresa too.

“Will you join me and the boys?” Teresa asked Egan.

Peg grinned.

“I’d be glad to join you,” Egan said.

And so the five of them set off on the path that led to the camp. It was about three-quarters of a mile back, and they didn’t
hurry. The two oldest O’Rahillys wanted to chat, and the children wanted to continue their games. And so they had barely gone
halfway to the camp when half an hour later they met John Carlysle walking up the path.

“Father!” the two boys cried out as one when John rounded the bend.

“Alex, David,” he said to each of them in greeting. ‘Teresa… Hello, Peg.” He gave her a warm smile. He liked the little girl.
And finally he said, “Egan, I’m glad I found you. I’ve been looking everywhere for you since your shift ended. Your wife told
me to look up here.”

“Then she told you right, Mr. Carlysle,” Egan said carefully. He still did not know how to talk easily and comfortably to
the man.

“I’d like to talk with you alone, Egan,” John said. “Can you walk with me without Peg for a way? I’d very much appreciate
it.”

“If you say so, Mr. Carlysle.” And then to Peg he said, “I’d like you to run with the boys, girl, would you?”

“No,” she said firmly, but she ran off the moment she said it.

“You’ll excuse us, Teresa?” John asked.

“Of course,” she said and set off briskly ahead of the two men.

When they were by themselves, John came to a halt, and Egan stopped with him. There were two cigars in John’s pocket. He offered
one to Egan, who took it gratefully, and he prepared the other for himself.

They both puffed on their cigars for a time to ensure that they were truly lit and drawing well. Then John began to speak.

“A little while ago,” he said, “I had a meeting with Mr. Collins.”

Egan pressed his lips together. “Yes,” he said tightly, bitterly.

“I called him in because I’m worried that we are not even approaching the schedule. There’s much to be done this summer; but
we haven’t yet even completed the work that was planned for the spring.”

Egan shrugged cautiously, not wanting to commit himself to being sympathetic to John’s problem. Nor did he want to appear
hostile.

“I want to trust you with some information, Egan,” John went on. “May I?” He looked at him with a fiercely intense yet open
look. “Can you keep what I am to tell you to yourself?”

“Yes, Mr. Carlysle. You know I’ll do that.”

“I was sure you would. And I’m sorry I did you the disservice of asking you—but I want you to know how important this conversation
is to me.”

“I can see that.”

“Good,” John said. He ceased talking for a moment to draw on his cigar. “I told Collins my thinking about his new work rules.”

Egan gave John a hard look. “You don’t like them, do you, any more than we do?”

“I don’t like them at all.” He paused and screwed up his face. “But how did you know my opinion about them?” John went on,
a little startled and dismayed that he had allowed himself to be so apparent. He prided himself on his ability to mask his
feelings, especially to the working men. He’d almost have preferred to walk naked through the streets of Philadelphia than
show a trace of emotion to his laborers.

“You’re not—by God—an open book, Mr. Carlysle, but a few of us can see pretty clearly where your sympathies lie. And we do
like you for that.”

John shook his head, not knowing whether to be pleased at their solidarity with him or upset because he had let his official
mask slip off so easily.

But then he realized that the issue of his maintaining his cool, deputy-chief-engineer’s composure was no longer at stake.
Events had taken him beyond that. So he pressed on.

“From where I stand, Egan, it looks like the rules are taking a toll upon the men. They’re sluggish; they’ve lost spirit.
They simply don’t do the job. They’re like a machine that’s been pushed too hard; they don’t want to go at all.”

“Aye, Mr. Carlysle, that’s pretty close to it, that is if you’re lookin’ at the men from the outside.”

“Can you tell me what it’s like from the inside?”

He gave him a look, assessing him to see if
he
should trust
him
. He decided he could.

“What you see, Mr. Carlysle, is the men lookin’ down and blue, because that’s what they want you to see. And by God, there’s
a lot inside ‘em that makes them that way.”

“It gives Collins his excuse…” John added.

“His excuse?”

“That’s right. His excuse to justify imposing additional rules and regulations: “The lazy, malingerin’ bastards need more
backbone, by Jesus,’ “ John repeated in a fair imitation of Collins’s voice.

“Oh, yes, aye, I get you,” Egan said.

“But what are the men like from the inside, Egan?”

Egan looked at him again. “Restless,” he said. “Angry. They’re ready to break, Mr. Carlysle. They’re close to exploding.

“I’m pretty sure you’ll see a strike soon, but that might not be ail you’ll see.” He wondered if he should have said that.
He didn’t fear to say such things to this man; he knew John would have a sympathetic ear. But he didn’t know what Carlysle
could do with the information. The men were near to striking, and the pressure was so great within them that a strike could
grow into rioting, or worse.

Egan knew that John Carlysle would not take Tom Collins’s side in this confrontation. But the conflict was not just between
Collins and the men. There was also the railroad administration to be reckoned with. Where would the management stand? With
Collins? Possible. With the men? Unimaginable.

But the railroad could get rid of Collins. And that was worth talking to John Carlysle about.

Egan knew he had to feel John Carlysle out very carefully now. He could be a formidable ally.

“How soon do you expect a strike?” John said.

“I don’t know, sir. This isn’t an organized thing. There’s no planning goin’ on. It’s a case of lightning striking. There’s
a storm brewing, and it’s going to be a rough one. When lightning strikes, it strikes, whenever and wherever. Do you take
my meaning?”

“I get you,” John said.

“If the men were organized,” Egan said, “they’d be better off. Then they could choose their own times and their own places
to fight or not to fight.”

“I don’t see how that’s true,” John said, shaking his head. “If the company provided them with good leaders to give them proper
direction, they’d never need to be organized.”

Egan was about to argue, but he stopped himself. This was not the time or the place for that.

“But you can help me, Egan, a great deal, for the men’s sake.” He ceased talking and took a long drag on the cigar. “Can you
keep me informed about the men? Let me know when they are likely to act… if they move?” John asked after he’d let out an immense
cloud of smoke.

“Informed?” Egan asked, bristling. It was a word that burned in him like few others. “I don’t like that word informed. I don’t
inform
, Mr. Carlysle. I didn’t
inform
for the British in Ireland, nor will I
inform
for your company in Pennsylvania.”

“Oh, damn it to hell, Egan,” John said, angry at himself for his own thick-headedness and insensitivity. “Please forgive me
for seeming to—”

“I’m not a company spy,” Egan broke in.

“I know that. I’m not asking you to be a spy. I used the wrong word. I’m sorry.”

Egan was on the point of throwing the cigar on the ground and stomping off.

“Egan O’Rahilly,” John said in a commanding voice, “don’t move! Keep your cigar in your mouth. And listen to me, would you?
Favor me for a time, for the sake of the little bit of trust you had for me a moment ago. And for the sake of the information
I’m about to tell you. You’ll want to know what I have to say, Egan.”

Egan paused, angry, bristling more than ever, poised to fly off. Then he stuffed the cigar in his mouth and breathed in a
long drag.

“All right, then,” he said finally. “Talk.”

“First of all, then, let me make myself totally clear. I don’t want any labor trouble. I don’t want any strikes. No strike
will ever be good for this railroad.”

Egan shrugged. “Go on,” he said.

“Nor are they of any use to the workers.”

“That’s not true,” Egan said.

“When you’re striking, you’re not earning,” John said simply. “And you earn precious little to start with. Any less money
comes in and…” He left the thought unfinished.

“It’s still not true,” Egan said.

“When a man takes employment with a firm,” John said, “he agrees to provide that firm with his labor. He cannot then refuse
to provide the firm with his labor… and still consider himself an employee of that firm. No man has that right.”

“It’s not that simple, Mr. Carlysle. Every man has the right to be treated like a man. If an employer treats him like something
less than a man—like a mule or a machine, for instance—then a man
must
refuse to cooperate with the employer.”

“The solution is to replace the employer,” John said, “if he is in the wrong.”

“And how do you propose to do that, Mr. Carlysle, without labor action?”

“There are ways,” John said, though not as confidently as he would have liked. “Legal ways. Standard ways. Proper and fair
ways.”

Egan laughed. “You’re neither a foolish nor an innocent man, Mr. Carlysle. But you are certainly speaking foolish— or else
maybe innocent—words.”

“I’m simply speaking about what is right,” John said. “And besides,” he added, “the company has all the power of the state
to back its position.”

“Not all,” Egan said. “Not when you count the labor the men bring to the company. They are not machines, Mr. Car-lysle. When
you set a locomotive on the tracks and fill it with water and fire up the boiler and open the throttle, the locomotive moves.
But a man can choose
not
to move.”

“With a gun to his head?”

“Sometimes even then, Mr. Carlysle. Sometimes there’s no other choice but
not
to move.”

John shook his head. He could not comprehend what Egan was saying to him. His concepts were as foreign to him as Chinese.
And the actions he was suggesting seemed as impossible as the reversal of gravity.

But John was an engineer and a practical man, not a thinker or a politician. And he wanted something practical done right
now. He wanted the construction workers to work. For two months they had been sluggish. But that could be changed by the proper
and controlled application of force. And that is what John wanted to do. In this he believed Egan might choose to be his ally.

“Sometimes,” Egan continued, “we might have to take up guns ourselves.”

“You may be right,” John said hollowly, for he didn’t believe that for a second. “But you and I still share a few aims, if
you’ll let me spell them out.”

“All right, you do that.”

“You want to work and earn your pay. I want you to work and earn your pay. Agreed?”

“Agreed. But—”

“I want no discussion, Egan. Let me go on with my points, will you please?”

“Yes, but—”

John raised his hand to silence him.

“Next,” he said, “I want no strikes and no damage to company property, and neither do you.”

“Not in principle. But if we are forced—”

“Next,” he said, raising his voice to drown out Egan’s arguing, “you and I both know what can initiate the kinds of events
neither of us wants. That’s Tom Collins and his rules. Agreed?”

“Yes,” Egan said, a little subdued. John was beginning to make some sense to him.

“I have to stop Tom Collins, Egan. You see that, and I see that.”

“Yes.”

“But he has his contract; and the company will honor it, as long as he appears to be honoring his end of it.”

“Even if what he does is the ruin of me and my friends.”

“Yes … and no. The company, officially, has no position regarding you and your friends. Your tie is with him, just as his
tie is with the company.”

“Then in the crunch, you will take his side?”

“
Not
if he has failed to live up to the terms of the contract. If the work is not done, then he will be replaced. But, according
to the contract, he has some leeway. That’s where he is now, in the leeway. In the margins. He can claim that events outside
his control prevent him from doing what he promised to do.”

“Events like …?”

“Like the men failing to work, or refusing to work.”

“And?”

“And he claims that by putting ever greater and greater pressure on the men, they will be forced to work.”

“But it’s just the opposite.”

“Yes! It’s just the opposite.”

“So what do you want me to do? Spy for you? Is that going to help you get rid of him? How is a spy like me going to help the
company?”

“No. I don’t want you to spy for me, Egan. But finish hearing me out.” He paused for a time, gathering his thoughts. “An hour
or so ago, like I said, I was with Collins and his man Henneberry.”

“The bastard,” Egan said and spat.

“I don’t think much of him either,” John admitted. “Anyhow, I met with them. And they told me a few things they hadn’t told
me before.”

“Such as?”

“They want to get rid of the leaders of the workers.”

“Meaning who?”

“You know very well who… You’re the first name they mentioned.”

“I’m honored,” Egan said ruefully. “And what did
you
say when they told you this?”

“I said it’s Tom Collins’s decision.”

“You what?” he snapped.

“I said I would have no part in it. It was his decision.”

“And you would just close your eyes and let it happen?” Egan asked. “Well, Jesus God, you’re a fine man. And you want me to
trust you and cooperate with you—”

“Damn it, Egan O’Rahilly. You are quick to come to conclusions. Would you listen for a moment?”

“I have been listening; and everything I hear I dislike.”

“I’m
not
sitting passively, Egan, and letting Tom Collins do his will. For one thing, I’m talking to you, and I’m telling you what
he said to me. It might… it just might behoove you to guess that I might want to do something to prevent what he wants.”