“Let him come in,” said Comrade Salvador. “If you say we can trust him, Vilaro, we must hear what he has to say.”
Ferrer was uncharacteristically diffident when he stooped through the door, and stood for a moment wringing his cloth cap in his hands. As usual, the room did not seem big enough for the man. The silence was broken by Jordi.
“Sit down, Comrade Ferrer. Mam, bring the man some wine. Ferrer, tell us what has made you so bold, that you visit us here?”
Without a smile, Ferrer nodded his recognition of Jordi, and sat. “The mill where I work is cutting production. You remember how busy it used to be, Senor Vilaro.” He nodded at Vilaro. “So far I’ve been lucky, the same as Tomas here.” He nodded again. “But so many have been laid off. I don’t know how long my luck will hold. We live in fear, so many are … at their wits’ end.” He looked round the room. Jordi felt sorry for this man who had been so strong and important at the mill, brought so low.
“There’s troubles everywhere.” Ferrer continued. “Everywhere, everyone … desperate. And there’s worse. There’s trouble brewing at the power station, you know, the Canadenca, near the old ship yard,” and turning to Jordi he added, “makes the electricity for your uniform factory.” Looking round the room, he went on. “They’ve tried to cut their wages. Christ, I beg your pardon, ma’am, but, Christ, they earn little enough as it is.”
Mam smiled: she was used to the men’s swearing.
“What’s happening?” asked Salvador.
“There’s a group of workers at the power plant tried to join the NCL. They’ve been given the sack. God, there’s so many out of work, the bosses think they can just treat everyone like this.”
“Thanks, Comrade Ferrer,” said Bonaventura. Looking round the room, he asked, “Is this the point of no return?”
“What do you mean?” asked Tomas.
“The point when we say enough is enough, when we act. The NCL has been growing and growing, we have over half a million members, most of them here in Barcelona, but many in other parts of Spain. We’re big enough now to take action.” said Bonaventura.
“Action? A strike?” said Tomas.
“An all-out strike? The whole city?” said Jordi.
“As I say, is this the time to down tools, and put out the lights? Is this the straw which breaks the camel’s back?” replied Bonaventura.
The others laughed. “Too many metaphors!” smiled Salvador, “but I know what you mean.”
“He’s right,” rejoined Vilaro. “We have the strength of numbers, and the whole city is in ferment.”
“Your time has come,” came an unexpected voice from the door way. They all turned to look. Grandmother Tomas was standing there. “Now is not a time to hesitate. Call the strike, and this time do it with eyes wide open and a gun in your hand!”
Nodding, Vilaro turned to Ferrer. “Comrade Ferrer, do you know these men at the power plant?”
“Two of them, yes,” replied Ferrer.
“Can you find them and bring them here?” continued Vilaro.
“Within the hour, I am sure,” said Ferrer.
True to his word, Ferrer brought two of the power workers back to the office, and the NCL committee was able to confirm the facts of the situation. When Salvador asked if they thought a strike would be supported, all in the room agreed. In many other gatherings in the city, similar conversations were taking place, and similar conclusions reached. Other small unions co-ordinated with the NCL, and strike plans, already drafted, were quickly put into action.
Within three days, industry in Barcelona was at a standstill. The bosses had been caught off-guard, and had no strategy to deal with the strike. They were faced with huge numbers of very angry workers, who remained entrenched; and they were very frightened by the apparent readiness of the workers, to use arms. The strike was total, the city paralysed.
Recognising their power, and without being subject to the violence of armed reprisals which had caused such chaos during Tragic Week, strike leaders were emboldened to demand significantly more than the re-instatement of the power workers.
Jordi and Tomas were prominent among many younger workers calling for an eight-hour working day. The black and red flag of the NCL was flying from offices, apartment buildings, and slum tenements. The workers were holding the city.
The port was gridlocked, with ships arriving unable to dock or unload, other ships half unloaded or loaded, and no movement of any kind on the quayside. Those factories which had been surviving the post-war recession saw a complete stand-off between managers and workers. The streets were quiet without trams or commercial traffic. Barcelona was rapidly becoming a ghost town.
For the first time, shop workers risked joining the strike. Benet and Jaume visited the office above the music shop in order to join the NCL, and Vilaro was delighted that his sons-in-law had declared their allegiance.
Local government proved impotent, and the National Government in Madrid was forced to intervene. Vilaro and all involved in managing the strike were astounded and delighted when the Madrid government came out in favour of the workers, and instructed the employers to accept the strikers’ demands. In supporting the demand for an eight-hour day, the Madrid politicians were pioneers in Europe, and all of the small offices and groups of the NCL and other unions thought they had much to rejoice about.
After six long weeks without income, and diminishing food supplies, the workers were pleased to be back at work in April 1919, and life resumed in the stalemate city. Benet and Jaume were particularly relieved that they were still employed in their respective shops, as they had spent much of the strike in a state of considerable fear of unemployment.
On the first evening after the return to work, Mam was ready with a bottle of Rioja to celebrate the victory, and Salvador proposed a toast. “Comrade Bonaventura, Comrade Vilaro, Comrades Jordi and Tomas, we salute you in your leadership of the workers. And Mam, and Grandmother, we salute your support and your hard work to keep us fed on meagre rations. To us all!”
Alas, the rejoicing was short-lived. Once back at work, the workers found no reduction in their working day, nor any increase in their wages. With rampant unemployment in the city, many had no appetite for further strike action, but the unrest and discontent continued. Although they had avoided the bloodshed of Tragic Week, the workers were back where they had started. A law was passed in Madrid establishing the eight-hour maximum working day, but once the strikers were back at work, the employers influenced the Madrid Government to quickly repeal the law.
It was a sombre and saddened group which met in the office over the music shop later that summer.
“We got nowhere,” said Jordi. “It’s so frustrating.”
“We get outwitted every time. Even with a huge membership, we’re beaten. Perhaps we will never progress without recourse to violence,” replied his father.
“We need better information,” said Tomas, “and be ready with our guns. They cannot beat us next time.”
“I believe we have a good spy in Comrade Ferrer,” observed Bonaventura. “Do we know we can continue to trust him?”
“I think so,” said Jordi. “He was always very fierce at work, probably still is, but that’s part of how he survives. No boss would ever suspect that a man who threatens the workers with a gun, would be on the workers’ side.”
“Threatens them with a gun?” asked Salvador.
“Yes,” said Jordi. “I was very scared.”
“He stood in front of me to protect me,” said Vilaro. “Neither of us knew, at the time, that the gun had no bullets, did we?”
“Are you sure?” asked Salvador. “I find it very hard to know who to trust.”
Within a few weeks, that trust would be tested. Ferrer arrived at the shop late one evening in November, claiming to have important information. After a hurried consultation with his fellows, Salvador agreed that Ferrer should come in. Once more the tall man stooped under the low door into the office, and folded himse
lf into a chair.
“Before you speak,” said Salvador, “I understand you have a gun.”
Ferrer muttered that he had.
“Do you have it with you now?” enquired Salvador.
Ferrer nodded.
“Please put it on the desk before we listen to you,” continued Salvador.
Ferrer pulled the gun from his coat, and there was a sudden in-take of breath. Salvador picked it up, and broke open the chamber. Then he grinned. “No bullets!” he told them, and there was a general sigh of relief.
“I don’t want to kill anyone,” said Ferrer, as morose as ever, “but it’s a good deterrent, got me out of a few scrapes, and,” he turned to Jordi and made a half-grin, “works well at the mill.”
“Tell us your information, man,” said Bonaventura.
Ferrer cleared his throat. “I overheard, just listening casually to my boss, that the employers are fighting back. They are getting more organised than ever before, and making it impossible for another strike to happen. And they will use force. You don’t need to worry about my gun, but there will be plenty of guns to worry about. There’s a new confederation, not of workers, but of employers. The FBE, Federation of Barcelona Employers.”
“What are they planning?” said Salvador.
“There’s going to be a lock-out,” said Ferrer.
“What’s that mean?” asked Vilaro.
“Tomorrow morning, when the workers arrive at the factory gates, they will be locked. If they want to keep their jobs, they will have to tear up their NCL membership cards, right there and then, in front of the managers, and then they will be allowed in to work. If they decline to tear up their cards, they will be refused entry, or worse.”
“Worse?” exclaimed Tomas.
“There’s talk of using guns at the factory gates, ruffians in the pay of the bosses, ready to shoot anyone who refuses to tear up his card.”
The room erupted in uproar. “This cannot be,” said Vilaro. “They would kill for belonging to our confederation?”
“Get the word out,” said Salvador. “Tell everyone to refuse to show their membership card. They can’t kill us all.”
“They might,” said Ferrer. “You will be shocked, no, horrified, to know that they are using armed thugs, who have been released from prison to do this job. We’re up against some very nasty, ruthless men.”
“Brothers, we must stand together, and stand firm,” said Salvador.
Through all the dark alleys of Barcelona, down back lanes, and cobbled passages, the word was spread. Door after door, knocked quietly, and the message passed. All across the city, the word was out, and the next morning saw workers in their hundreds gathering silently at factory gates, their hands firmly in their pockets. The gates remained locked. The workers remained still and silent. The managers were ignored, and the few gun carrying thugs unnerved. No shots were fired. No factory opened. Halfway through the day, the crowds melted away.
The groups in the NCL offices all over the city could not tell if they had achieved a victory or not, and the lock-out continued for several more days. Each day the workers would arrive and stand silently at the factory gates, whilst the employers peered from upper floor windows, furious in their impotence.
To find a way out of the impasse, Bonaventura and Vilaro talked endlessly. Salvador rushed from office to office, finding only the same inability to proceed, and every day, Jordi and Tomas would come home to the smoke-filled room, having spent hours standing silently at the respective factory gates. Reports reached them of sporadic gun fire, of workers being singled out and shot in the streets, at the factory door. There was a tension in the air, which added to the stress in the NCL office.
Once more it was Ferrer, who was rapidly becoming part of the group having gained their trust as a spy, who brought news; and this time it was bad.
“You’ve seen these thugs, brought in by the employers to stand at the factory gates? They’re mostly ex-criminals and gangsters, many let out of prison early to do the bosses’ dirty work. They’re getting trigger happy, taking pot shots, almost for fun, at the workers, and the bosses are encouraging this. There’s big money being put together to create a kind of secret army. I know, because the owner of the factory where I, and Tomas, work, the Marques de Comillas, is a sponsor. Your remember him? The one who came in that flashy car, owner of the ship that sparked the Tragic Week, it’s the very same man. He’s putting up a lot of money, and he’s recruited a true gangster to run the operation.”
“It’s clear we’re up against a terrible enemy,” said Vilaro. “This is becoming like a war.”
“You said, ‘a true gangster’ to run the operation. Is this anyone we know?” asked Bonaventura.
“I don’t know if you know him,” replied Ferrer. “His name is Bravo Portillo. He used to be chief of police in Madrid. That’s what they can do with money, big money: recruit a big name, a powerful man, ready to use force against the workers.”
“What’s going to happen next?” asked Jordi.
“I’ve heard that the gates will be unlocked, and the workers allowed back to work. It will seem like a victory, but it will not be – and we must beware. Any further action, and the thugs will be drawing their guns more regularly, and using them,” said Salvador. “There’s a new law giving them a chance to shoot us in the back. It’s called the fugitive law, and it says it’s OK to shoot anyone trying to escape.”
“That’s pretty vague,” said Jordi. “You mean, some thug wants to see my papers, I say no, and turn away, and he could shoot me?”
“Precisely,” said Salvador.
“And that’s what this gangster Portillo is all about,” said Ferrer. “You are all vulnerable, all of you, all of us, in this room. At the moment, I overhear many conversations, but if there is any suspicion against me, I’ll be a goner.”
“We understand the risks you take, Comrade Ferrer,” said Bonaventura. “You must always take great care that you are not seen coming to meet us.”
“I’ll tell them I’m learning the fiscorn!” joked Ferrer, in a rare moment of humour, “which is why I need to come to a music shop.”
“I could even supply you with an old battered horn,” said Bonaventura, “but I hate to think what would happen if they asked you to play it! Perhaps you could carry an old horn with you, as you come and go.”
“I hear gangsters in Chicago carry violin cases,” said Tomas. “Carrying a fiscorn’s not such a bad idea. And you could keep your gun in it.”
“Joking aside,” said Vilaro, “you should start putting bullets in that gun. You never know when you may need it.”
“I keep up a pretence of being a bully at the factory,” said Ferrer, “but I’ve never killed anyone. I was pretty horrified to see men dying on the street in Tragic Week.”
“We were all surprised,” said Tomas, “but we must get over that. The time is coming when we must respond to guns with guns. We’ve talked about it enough. Where do we get them from?”
“I agree, said Vilaro. “The time has come.”
“You know what I think,” said Jordi. “I still believe we can win without violence.”
“No, the others are right,” said Salvador. “The time has come to be armed.”
“Yes,” came Grandmother’s voice. She had sat quietly, almost unnoticed in the corner. “If I was younger, I’d take a rifle and shoot them all. Our home is becoming a city ruled by gangsters and guns. Given a chance, I’d be out there, and I wouldn’t wait for them to fire first. Give me a gun, and I’ll show you how to use it!”
Mam smiled. “Grandmother, we must leave it to the younger men. Don’t make jokes about guns.”
Grandmother turned to Mam, and spoke very slowly and clearly. “I’m not joking. I would love to be the first to pull the trigger.” Turning to the men in the room, she repeated, “With a gun in my hand, I’ll be ready to show you how to use it!”
Bonaventura spoke slowly and carefully. “You know, we must beware of taki
ng this threat too lightly, beware of talking about war as if it would be fun. Perhaps everything we’ve done so far was trivial and superficial. We’ve created a huge and powerful collective of workers, and we’ve not achieved anything. Our brothers in Russia didn’t win the revolution by sitting in smoky rooms over music shops. They armed themselves and went out onto the streets. They knew their lives were at risk, and they didn’t hesitate. If all that reading of those difficult books by Russians, means anything, it means what we face now. The struggle for workers in Barcelona, in Catalonia, and indeed the whole of Spain, is rapidly becoming an armed struggle.”
CHAPTER SIX
The Ramblas had long been a magnet for beggars of all kinds. Some simply exposed rather revolting injuries of the flesh, or amputations sustained in war or from the dangers of daily life. Others took advantage of physical deformities – dwarves and hunchbacks, men born without arms or legs, and women with beards. Some took their begging to a higher and more profitable level, with costumes and face-paint.
Jordi and Tomas particularly enjoyed a fat woman who dressed herself as the old English queen, Victoria. She had an enamel chamber pot, decorated with silk flowers, into which Jordi would drop a small coin in order to hear her high- pitched voice screech a vulgar condemnation of King Alphonso, married, in her opinion, to her misguided granddaughter.
Another regular mime on the Ramblas was a woman who was unnaturally tiny, dressed herself as a baby, and climbed into a battered old perambulator. Drop a coin into the tin cup on the pram, and she would gurgle contentedly. Jordi found the baby-woman very disconcerting, and did not walk too closely.
Recently, a new beggar had appeared, and settled himself on the pavement outside the music shop. Vilaro watched him from the office window, and told the others that he thought there was something suspicious. This new beggar was obviously a dwarf, and had turned himself into a toad. He squatted on the pavement with a hideous helmet, covered in green slime and pustules, wearing some kind of green garment which made him look horribly fat and bloated.
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