by Kim Newman
"Jack and Howie? They carried on their business for a while, I think. Jack eventually quit to write books. Howie? Who knows? I like to think he's still out there somewhere. Those guys were legends. They flew all over the country at a time when most folks never expected to go beyond ten or twenty miles outside their home-town in a lifetime. Me, I've been all over the place, and I always used to make a point of asking folks if Jack and Howie had been through back in the '40s or early '50s. And a lot of the time they had, putting on a show, spraying crops, getting drunk, falling foul of the Party or the local law. They didn't take any crap from anyone at a time when everyone had to take a lot of crap. And that's good enough for me..."
The crowd at Texas Jack's had been getting impatient with the second-rate band that had been grinding its way through three-chord covers all afternoon. So when they finished slaughtering Bruce Springsteen's "Born in the USSA", they got no encouragement at all to continue. They seemed to take it in good spirits. The place was full now, and Lowe knew people had been sneaking looks at him, envying his temporary monopoly on C.H. Holley, impatient for the musician to get on stage. The Crickets, Holley's backing band, were in the club already, setting up. This gig hadn't been announced, but everybody knew about it. Over the years, a finely-tuned grapevine had been cultivated all over America.
"Guess I have to go to work," said Holley, strumming his fingers on his chest.
C.H. Holley shook Lowe's hand, and got up onto the stage. He strapped his guitar on, and, without tuning up, hit a chord. He was perfectly in tune, calling up the music like an old friend. He played some of the old songs, and a lot of the new ones. Everything Lowe had heard about him was true.
"Heart-beattt" Holley sang, "why do you miss. .."
TEN DAYS THAT SHOOK THE WORLD
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1912-1917
Thursday, December 19th, 1912.
The Union Stockyard, Chicago, Illinois.
"Dash!"
Only Carter called him that. Sam heard his fellow Pinkerton's shout and turned, revolver drawn. He did not want to shoot anyone today, much less a starving Wobblie, but he was here to protect the President-Elect. And the Rough Riders, a mounted band of volunteer strike-breakers and gadabout gallants, were going to be in trouble if Teddy didn't back down.
Outside the gates of the Union Stockyard, the pickets had been reinforced. Among the ragged, desperate placard-wavers—meat-packers who had been laid off or who had had their wages cut—were a few cooler fish, tough-looking birds who looked a sight readier for a fight than the glory hounds trotting along behind Teddy, tall in their saddles, shotguns resting on their thighs, revolvers in buttoned-down chamois holsters on their hips.
Sam looked across the street, trying to see his partner. Nicholas Carter was half-way up a lamp-post, waving furiously, pointing at the President. Teddy must think he was back in Cuba two terms, three elections and one political party ago. Mounted on a splendid grey, he was ambling out of the ranks of the Rough Riders, easing his way through the cordon of Irish cops, entering alone the space of some twenty yards between the pickets and the law.
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The President was either going to make a speech or call a charge. Sam wouldn't have advised either course. For the first time, he truly saw the face of the man whose life he was supposed to preserve. The famous grin was still there, and the round spectacles, but everything else was sagging, fading, flaking away. Sam had heard the newly-elected "Bull Moose" Progressive was not in the pink of health. He looked older than fifty-four.
The strikers' placards stopped waving, and the noise died. Sam could hear the clip-clop of the presidential horse's hooves. By the force of his legendary presence, Teddy had quelled, at least for a few moments, the fury of the crowd. Sam hoped the President would try appealing to reason. He would fail, but bloodshed might be put off.
You can't tell men whose wives and children have no food in their bellies to go home and be peaceable, to thank God for their blessings. Especially not if you intended to pot a few of them for sport and pose with the corpses for the rotogravure, then dine on pheasant under glass at a mayoral reception for the victor of poll and picket line. For the bulk of the people in this angry street, it was going to be a meagre Christmas.
Teddy surveyed the strikers, baring his teeth like an angry rat. Sam wished he had a shot of whisky in his hand.
This whole tour was getting nervier and nervier. Last night, Teddy had gorged himself in splendour with Colonel Cody at the Biltmore, after watching the show. Buffalo Bill's Wild West and Pawnee Bill's Far East. Teddy and the Colonel were old friends; the original Rough Riders had taken their name from Buffalo Bill's earlier show, the Wild West and Congress of the Rough Riders of the World. All through the spectacle, Sam had been on edge, unable to hear Frank Butler shoot a bauble without involuntarily reaching for his gun.
There had been pickets outside the arena. Teddy had mistaken them for well-wishers and insisted on taking a bow. Carter had nobly stepped in front of a rotten egg meant for the President. Next time it might not be an egg.
Sam was drinking again. This triumphal tour, "to sort out the local difficulties and see off this foulfart Debs" was wavering between farce and disaster. Whatever happened, his nerves would suffer. At the second reception last night, which Carter contemptuously called "the servants' ball", even the lesser performers in Cody's Cavalcade had been dubious about the situation. All over the country, he had been hearing similar sentiments.
Eugene Byrne & Kim Newman
It was hard to believe that Teddy had won his election only six weeks ago, beating the incumbent, his former Republican party-mate Taft, into third place after the Democrat Wilson. The first strikes had already begun while the polls were being counted. "One Big Union, One Big Strike," Eugene V. Debs had said, throwing what little weight the IWW had behind the stockyard employees. Debs's little weight was growing, Sam knew. At almost a million votes, the Socialist had come a long way behind even Taft in the election, but rushing about the country in his Red Special, he had been garnering increasing support. And if Teddy wanted to shoot a few thin-limbed meat-packers today, Debs would pick up more votes, more hearts, more guns...
"If that man's not careful," the small woman who shot so prettily in the arena had said, "he'll be carrying an ounce or two of lead under his well-filled waistcoat."
Teddy raised his arm, and Sam's heart spasmed. He was going to signal a charge! No. Sam breathed again as the President began to speak.
"Stand aside, and let these honest men through," he bellowed.
The pickets were in control of the Union Stockyard, inside and out. Sam heard Debs himself was sitting in the foreman's office, cronies Big Bill Haywood and Joe Hill with him, organising his campaign like a great general.
Teddy signalled for his Rough Riders to advance and they did, at a surprisingly disciplined trot. Half were society heroes, parading their elegant horses, but the rest were veterans of Teddy's campaigns, knuckle-heads who wanted a legal opportunity to shed some Red blood, and paid thugs. The cops, most of whom had relatives on the other side of the street and were here under threat of being fired, melted away to the sides of the advance. A few quivering, shabbily-dressed figures crept behind the horsemen.
"These honest men," Teddy said, indicating the creepers, "wish to work."
"Scabs," someone shouted.
The riot nearly started then. Everyone was shouting something. Sam saw Carter pulled down from his lamp-post by a cop, and wave his Pink badge as if he were brandishing the sword of God. The Agency had rank in anything to do with the President's safety.
He had to get near Teddy. Then, he could see what was coming. He pushed through the horses, ignoring the well-spoken and foully-spat oaths
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showered on him, holding up his badge and his gun like free passes to a ball-game.
There was scuffling at the gates, as strike-breakers with axe-handles
and baseball bats got in there to clear a path for the "scabs" Teddy had sworn to shepherd right onto the killing floor. "One Big Union, One Big Strike," the pickets were chanting. More pickets were flowing out from somewhere, adding strength to the human defences. Sam knew Teddy had underestimated Debs. The "dreaming blowhard" was a better general than anyone gave him credit for.
Sam was close to the President now. Teddy's face was flushing red in spots, and the cold turned his breath to fog. If there had to be a fight, he was ready for it. He had his own gun out now. The man who was too tender-hearted to shoot a bear cub was about to gun down some of his fellow Americans. Their crime, as Cody's lady sharp-shooter had said, was "wanting to protect their families from cold, hunger and disease".
Sam was the only one close enough to hear Teddy's last word, "bully!" The shot neatly broke the President's spectacles. Sam saw a red trickle run down the side of Teddy's nose, and realised that the back of the man's head was blown away, his slouch hat with it.
As Teddy tumbled from his rearing horse, a barrel-shaped corpse, the Rough Riders met a hail of projectiles from the roof of the stockyards, and pickets laid into strike-breakers with ferocity. Sam was the only one who knew the President was dead.
He knew where the shot had come from. Taking his blows, he pushed through the fighting. Someone hit him in the side with a bludgeon, and he thought a few ribs were staved in. He forced himself on, teeth grit against the pain.
There were other shots now, from the Rough Riders. The scion of one wealthy family was pulled from his saddle, and soundly kicked, his gun passed to a picket.
Sam saw the small figure running away, and wondered if Teddy had been brought down by a child. There were plenty of hungry children in the IWW. Suddenly, a path was clear, and Sam ran through it, hurdling groaning bodies, escaping from the press of people.
"Halt," he shouted, a stab of pain in his lungs, icy wind in his face. Cold, salt tears filled his eyes.
The fleeing assassin did not stop. Sam was slow, though, wheezing. He was gaining on the killer. He could either stop, take a careful aim, and bring him down, risking a miss and the assassin's escape. Or he
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Eugene Byrne & Kim Newman
could keep running, and hope his injury didn't stop him before he caught up with the gunman.
He ran on, shouldering past a fat woman wearing a "READY FOR TEDDY" sash. The noise of the fighting was spreading, as was the riot itself. Sam outpaced the chaos, fixing his attention on the faltering figure in the long overcoat and big cap, scarf wrapped around his face.
The assassin stumbled. Sam covered the twenty yards between them, his lungs screaming. He threw himself on the killer, landing a blow with the butt of his revolver. The scarf came away, and Sam recognised the face. The small, bundled-up figure was not a child, but a woman.
He expected her to shout "long live the Revolution" or some Red slogan. Instead, she seemed relieved, and was trying to sit up, trying to get back her breath. His own heart was hammering, and he tasted blood in his mouth.
"Annie," he said, "why?"
"Sic semper tyrannis" she quoted.
He eased off her, and slumped against a wall, wondering how badly he was hurt inside. Her hands were on him, feeling for his wounds.
"Never was an Indian fighter," she said, "but I've seen enough falls and spills in the Wild West to know some bone-setting. Bite."
He sank his teeth in his coat cuff as she wound her scarf around his chest. The pain surged and peaked as his bones ground back together, and then faded. She walked away.
Later, Samuel Dashiell Hammett would tell himself he had let her go. But now he was too weak and too confused to do anything about the woman who had killed Theodore Roosevelt, the last democratically-elected President of the United States of America.
Tuesday, March 4, 1913.
The Capitol, Washington, D.C.
Reed was not the only one in the crowd with war wounds. He had picked up his bruises in Paterson, New Jersey, where he had been trying to organise a strike of silk-workers. One night a group of men in flour-sack hoods had come to his boarding house and burned it down. Reed and the other two Wobblies were lucky to get out alive. Since Roosevelt's fall, a lot of good union men had been killed. There were wars in the offing, and not just in Mexico or Europe.
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He was at the Inauguration on his press ticket, although he didn't have a paper to write for any more. The police and the Pinkertons had closed down Max Eastman's The Masses, Liberator and any other organ of dissent they could sniff out. Even Hamilton Holt's liberal magazine The Independent had had its offices closed down and sealed. The assassin was still unknown, thus beyond even a rich man's justice. Therefore, the hawks of the House of Have were swooping down on anyone who raised voice against them. The 'plutes hadn't reacted so violently when President McKinley had been shot by a solitary, crazed anarchist. This was different, and everyone knew it. Everyone had to decide which side they were on in the coming war. The War of the Classes.
He could not bear to listen to the President's swearing-in or the inaugural address. The former he knew by heart and the latter he had already read in the New York Inquirer. In theory, Kane had given up his newspaper interests—to his teen-age son—when he consented to be Roosevelt's running mate, but in practice the President's papers were still his mouthpiece. In a sense, that was good news. At least you could guarantee the Pulitzer and Hearst press printed an approximation of the truth, out of enmity for the rival plutocrat if not devotion to the betterment of society.
Reed had felt he had to come, just to see the circus. He turned his coat collar up against the blast, and wandered among the crowds, keeping a wary eye out for policemen. Nothing had been announced yet, but he was sure he was on the Pinkertons' Red list. The celebrations were genuine, but muted. Even Taft—aptly the fattest President ever to squeeze into the White House—had rated more real enthusiasm.
In his speech, Kane was reassuring America that things were going to change but the old values would be preserved. Power and privilege would pass on intact to the next generation of Robber Barons. A whole raft of anti-trust laws—which, barely ten years before, Kane's papers had vigorously supported—were due to be revoked, and a friendly new family system was being readied.
Beside Kane was his silly wife Emily, bear-like in her shroud of furs. And next to the First Lady stood her spiritual adviser, the completely bald Englishman who styled himself the Great Beast and was rumoured to have put a curse on Roosevelt to bring his patron's husband to power. J.P. Morgan and Andrew Carnegie were not on the platform, content to stay in the warm and let their fellow club-man toss a few waves to the mobs while they drank brandy in their libraries.
Eugene Byrne & Kim Newman
Born in a Colorado boarding house, the new President was something of a joke to his peers.
The bunting looked surprisingly cheap for a man of solid financial standing, and a party who had fought and won an election with the backing of bankers and industrialists who treated dollars like footsoldiers, sending them out as cannon fodder to overwhelm the opposition. Short measure had always been a secret tenet of Carnegie's "Gospel of Wealth" Reed supposed.
"John," someone said, nearby. Reed turned, and saw a mask of grinning bandages.
"Jack?" he breathed.
The face nodded under his hat. Reed felt his own bruise, and was appalled at the extent of the injury his comrade must have suffered.
"No," London shook his head, reading Reed's thought, "it's a disguise."
Reed might have laughed.
"I'm hoping the Pinks won't think of looking for me here."
"Everyone's on the look-out for assassins."
London snorted through his bandages.
"Have you heard the rumour that it was me?"
Reed had, and had not been sure. There were people in the IWW, or affiliated to it, who would not hesitate to shoot a President or two. Jack London was
certainly one of their number. If it came to the opportunity and he had a revolver rather than a notebook and pencil in his travelling case, so was John Reed.
"My favourite story," London said, "is that it was Jesse James, come back for another crack at the Pinks."
London steered him through the crowd, away from the very visible row of bodyguards and police.
"All the bars are shut," London complained, "I've heard they're thinking of making the country go dry. Brewers are mainly German, you know. The working men could better spend their dollars and cents on American goods."
"A mistake, I think. If a man is denied the opportunity of seeking oblivion in alcohol, he will need to hold his head high. And to do that, he needs to be free..."
London did not seem impressed with the argument. Reed knew his comrade was a drinker.
"Should we perhaps take the opportunity of visiting the Constitution?" London suggested. "To see if Ford or Cross are busy rewriting selected clauses."
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"A slave-owners' charter," Reed said.
London shrugged. All around, white marble was lightly frosted with the persistent cold. There were uniformed police, ranks of soldiers in their dress blues and obvious Pinkerton men patrolling or on sentry duty in every street. The capital city was under military rule.
Eugene Debs was in South America, Reed knew. Theodore Dreiser, Emma Goldman and Elizabeth Gurley Flynn were in jail, thinking and debating; Big Bill Haywood, Joe Hill and canny old Daniel De Leon were on the run, agitating and organising. Every week, the Kane press gloated over the capture of a new "ring-leader" inevitably branding them as the man who pulled the trigger or the man who sold the gun or the man who gave the order. Two days ago, the Pinkertons had gone so far as to arrest eighty-two-year-old Mary Harris Jones and to charge her under the new Emergency Powers Acts. Mother Jones had been in West Virginia, at a coal strike, in the midst of a battle between armed miners and federal troops. She had been hand-cuffed and dragged away, her skirts raised and tied over her head.
