by John Jakes
“For Christ’s sake, Margaret!” Gideon roared, leaping to his feet. Margaret reached for her daughter’s shoulder as if she meant to hurt her further. Gideon jumped between them. He pushed Margaret away from the terrified girl.
“Eleanor, go to bed. This instant!”
Eleanor fled up the stairs while Gideon shook his wife by the shoulders.
“Control yourself, Margaret. Control yourself!”
iii
She tried, dabbing her eyes with the back of her wrist. “I—I’m sorry. It’s been a terrible evening.”
“Obviously.” He was weary of wondering why her breath smelled as it did. “What have you been drinking? The port from the cellar?”
She looked as stunned as Eleanor a moment ago. Quickly, she backed away. She started to cover her mouth but realized what she was doing and dropped her hand back to her side. Her tone grew defensive.
“Drinking? Nothing!”
The lie shocked him, then filled him with a confused sadness as she faced away and put a hand over her eyes, gasping out her words between bursts of crying, “But it’s a wonder I don’t drink after all I’ve gone through. Will’s been sick most of the day, and you didn’t come home and didn’t come home, and Eleanor’s so willful, she refuses to go to bed when she’s told. All she cares about is practicing her singing and dancing in secret—”
Margaret’s eye fell on the shattered statuary. She sobbed harder than ever.
Again Gideon’s face showed anger. He overcame it, walked to her, drew her against him. She caught the odor of the liquor with which he’d cleaned up. She wrenched away.
“You’re a fine one to make ridiculous accusations about drinking! You smell like a distillery. Were you in a saloon brawl?”
“How kind of you to ask! I thought you were more concerned about the Rogers group than about me. No, I was not in a saloon brawl. The Beacon was visited by some gentlemen hired to protest my editorial about the Washington railroad lobby. I managed to survive their tender inducements to stop writing about Jay Cooke’s brother.”
“I’ve told you before, Gideon,” she breathed. “It’s going to keep happening unless you quit. Over and over, it’s going to keep happening. Beatings. People shooting at you on dark streets—”
Staring at her, he was struck by a sudden insight. During their courting days in Richmond early in the war, he’d known little of books, or of the kind of ideas which shaped and moved the world. In terms of those things, he’d been much like an infant barely able to crawl.
After the war, Margaret had helped him learn to walk. She’d read to him at the supper table. Encouraged him to try to read increasingly difficult material on his own, then to attempt to write short paragraphs expressing his personal convictions.
Perhaps she regretted all that, as Jephtha had said parents regretted their children growing to adulthood. Margaret had taught him to walk so he could leave home and, intellectually, he had done so, moving into a deeper and deeper involvement with the world. He was like the grown child who would no longer be directed and controlled.
And she was the parent who would not gracefully let go.
The insight made his scalp prickle. He knew it was right. Didn’t she tend to be domineering with her daughter and her son? Her fury over Eleanor’s disobedience demonstrated that all over again. Somehow he had become not merely her husband but also another of her children—the most independent one, the most troublesome one. God, why hadn’t he thought of it earlier? It explained so much about her recent violent moods.
It disturbed him, too. Profoundly. All at once he craved a drink.
In the regular liquor cabinet, none of the bottles seemed to have been disturbed. He poured a generous shot of bourbon and drank it to ease the aches in his body and the newer one in his mind.
She was staring at him, awaiting a response, her eyes sullen. With all the patience he could muster, he said, “You mustn’t take everything so seriously, Margaret. Of course I got hurt a little tonight. But the men didn’t mean to do me any permanent injury.”
“What about the shooting?” she blazed at him.
“In Baltimore?” He structured a careful distortion. “That was an isolated case. One random shot, late at night. I’m not even positive it was aimed at me.” That was an outright lie—to spare her.
“Well—well”—she staggered to a chair, sat sideways in it, her head averted, her eyes closed—“you know what happened to my father in the Mexican War. Then I nearly lost you to the Yankees, and not just once. Manassas. The Peninsula. Yellow Tavern. That damnable prison—”
Her eyes flew open. “Now I’m in danger of losing you all over again. I worry all the time!”
He doubted it, but felt unkind for thinking it.
“—and—and”—half speaking, half crying, she let it pour out—“I’m so sick of it, Gideon. So sick of—the way we live. Grubbing—when there’s—so much money—and a job waiting at the Union—a high-paying, safe job—if you’ll just—speak to Molly—”
He was angered that she brought up the same old requests again tonight. But he fought the anger and went to her side a second time. She recoiled from the touch of his fingers on her shoulder. Forcing himself, he spoke in a calm voice.
“Margaret, I have explained again and again that if we lived any more lavishly, no one would take the Beacon seriously.”
“Who cares if they do?” she cried softly. “Who cares? I don’t!” Suddenly more coherent, she gazed at him, something hard and uncompromising in her dark eyes. “I want you to give it up, Gideon.”
I don’t want you to grow up and leave me, Gideon.
“You know I can’t.”
“Won’t. You mean won’t!”
“What’s happened to you, Margaret? There was a time—and not too long ago—when you encouraged me. You were the one who taught me to read and write and think, and now you act as if you hate the result.”
She whispered, “I do. I made a mistake. A dreadful mistake. Believe me, Gideon, I never would have helped you if I’d realized your main concern in life would turn out to be the welfare of a lot of greenhorns and niggers. Your work has taken you away from me, and I’m facing the very same situation I faced during the war. I’m facing the possibility of losing you. I don’t want that. I won’t tolerate it. Above everything, I demand that you think about this family and put this family first!”
The measured words told him he was right in his assessment of her motives. Deep within her, there was some unhealthy need to be obeyed, some compulsion to be the dominant partner. He tried to reason with her.
“I do think about the family. It’s one of my most important concerns—”
“I want it to be the only one! I’m sick of being poor!”
“Margaret, please. I try to see that all our needs are met—that we live comfortably. Can you imagine how I’d be received at a meeting like the one coming up in Chicago when word got around that my wife and children were ensconced in a Fifth Avenue mansion?”
She sprang up and rushed to the wrapped photograph. “But that’s the sort of house we should have! It’s the sort of house I want! We’ve been married nearly ten years and haven’t lived in a decent place yet!”
He started to protest but didn’t. He was alarmed by the near-hysteria in her voice.
“Look what arrived today—from Cheyenne. From the Boyles—”
Gideon stiffened. He hated to hear that damned Irishman’s name. Boyle had greedily utilized his portion of the inheritance to build and expand his chain of retail stores. Even Matt, who’d used his share to finance his art studies in Paris, hadn’t spent a tenth as lavishly. And Gideon had only drawn on the money to finance the Beacon and provide minimum subsistence for himself and Margaret.
Margaret thrust a brown-tinted print at him. He saw why she was envious. The photograph, taken from a point some distance from the subject, showed an immense three-story Gothic house with a wide veranda, dormers and a corner tower. The two stiff figures po
sed on the veranda—the Irishman and his wife, Hannah, the latter with a swaddled infant in her arms—were dwarfed by the huge residence.
“It’s their new house, Gideon. Hannah’s letter said they’ve just moved in.”
He flung the photograph away. “Damn braggarts.”
But he felt a shameful stab of jealousy as he helped himself to more bourbon.
His head was pounding. His whole body throbbed. He wanted to lie down and sleep, and was alternately furious with Margaret and fearful because her nerves seemed in such a precarious state.
“Well, Gideon,” she said. It had a forbidding sound of finality. “I believe we might as well thrash this out. And right now. It’s time you decided what’s important.”
He almost laughed in disbelief. Then, abruptly, he hurled the bourbon glass to the hearth, where it shattered. He stalked toward her.
“Three hired thugs beat the hell out of me tonight, Margaret. Three men I dutifully reported at the precinct house, even though I know the police will never find them. Then I crawl home and you deliver ultimatums!”
“Yes,” Margaret said in a voice so controlled, his backbone crawled. She pressed a white fist against her skirt. “Because I am tired of scrimping. Because I am tired of being afraid for you day and night—”
Because I am tired of your not doing what I say?
God forgive him, such thoughts were despicable. Farfetched, too. And yet when he looked in her eyes, he wondered.
“I think,” she went on in a low voice, “we should draw a symbolic line and see whether you’re willing to cross it. Chicago. Let’s make Chicago the line. You’ve been planning another one of your foolish trips. If you want to show me the family comes first, don’t go. If you do, you mustn’t expect to come home and find things as they were.”
“Margaret, you can’t ask me to make such a choice!”
“I can and I do, Gideon.” She was trembling; even her face was white now. “Your work or this family. The Beacon or this family. Chicago or this family.”
“No, I refuse. You’re being unfair. Three years ago, we agreed I would work on behalf of the movement. We agreed I could do that and we could still have our home life.”
He reached out to grasp her arm, hoping an extra measure of gentleness might save the situation and bring her to her senses. It didn’t. She wrenched away a third time.
“People change, Gideon, and kindly don’t touch me again.”
“What?”
Something absolutely unfamiliar and terrifying shone in her eyes as she bent forward at the waist, her hands clenched in fists again.
“I said don’t touch me. I’m sorry I had your children. I’m sorry I have to bring them up this way. I can promise you there’ll be no more children to suffer the way Eleanor and Will suffer.”
“Damn it, Margaret, you aren’t even making sense now!”
“Yes,” she said, “yes, at long last I am being sensible. You’ve made your choice. Don’t come to my room or my bed again. Ever!”
Red-faced, he roared, “By God, I won’t! I’ll sleep in the goddamn shed rather than roll over like a tame dog every time you snap your fingers!”
He stormed past her, deliberately kicking fragments of the broken Rogers group out of his path. Before he limped out of the house, he turned and shouted, “I’m going to Chicago just as I planned!”
He slammed the front door, so stunned and furious he never saw Eleanor’s gleaming, frightened eyes watching from between the stair posts.
iv
His father had once told him that if a married couple went to sleep without patching up an evening quarrel, even worse bitterness would result in the morning. He didn’t know whether it was actually true, but he’d always acted as if it were and had made sure neither of them said good night still bearing a grudge. He’d always made it a rule to be first to apologize, no matter who had started the argument.
Tonight he broke that rule.
Except for the occasions when he’d been out of town, or she’d been recovering from bearing the children, it was the first night since their marriage that they had slept apart. It marked the real beginning of the trouble between them.
Chapter III
TINDERBOX
i
GIDEON TRAVELED TO Chicago aboard second-class cars of the Erie and Lake Shore and Michigan railroads. Perhaps because he’d slept in so many uncomfortable places during the war, his habits had undergone a change and he could no longer sleep anywhere except in a bed. Since he hadn’t paid extra to ride in one of George Pullman’s special cars with the unique hinged seats that converted into berths, he was worn out by the end of the trip. Worn out from sitting up all night. Worn out from thinking about Margaret.
The morning after their quarrel, he’d resolved to apologize and had done so. During the hour before he boarded a car for the city, she’d refused to answer him. When he came home that night and tried again, the apology was acknowledged with a slight nod. Her out-thrust cheek had signaled that he could plant a kiss there if he wished.
Damn generous of her! he’d thought. But for the sake of harmony, he’d done it. He hoped to God the turmoil of the preceding evening hadn’t really been the product of some emerging need for dominance. He hoped it had only been the result of an especially fatiguing day.
On the night the apology was accepted, he’d returned to the large bed they shared. Their affection had been perfunctory ever since, and their lovemaking nonexistent. Margaret kept her temper and, as far as he could tell, stayed away from the bottles of port in the cellar. Nevertheless she clung to her position that the trip to Chicago was a symbol of whether he cared more for his work or for his family.
Repeatedly, he attempted to explain that one needn’t exclude the other, and that to force a confrontation created pointless pain for both of them. But something in her cried out for a victory, and he got nowhere. They’d had another short, loud argument the night before his departure—and once more they slept apart.
On the long journey west, he thought about his work at some length. Considering what had happened, he did have doubts about continuing the Beacon. But the doubts were banished the moment he recalled Daphnis Miller’s death.
Strelnik had been right that night on Third Avenue. Reformism was dead as a means of dealing with the juggernaut of industrialism. The masses of workers couldn’t traipse off to some bucolic retreat and survive. To put bread in the bellies of their families, they had to reach an accommodation with the factory system and the men who controlled it. And a favorable accommodation only came about through the use of the strength conferred by unity.
Of course conflicts between owners and workers were by no means new in America; study had taught him that. Such conflicts dated to colonial times, when craftsmen had been scarce and wages high for a brief period. The worker never seemed to remain on top for long, though. In 1630, the Massachusetts General Court had set a ceiling on craftsmen’s wages and established fines for any employer who paid more. Similar laws had been enacted in other colonies. When all the laws began to be repealed, those punishing overpayment by employers disappeared much more rapidly than those punishing workers for accepting overpayment.
American craft unions had been in existence at least since the 1790s. That decade had seen the organization of the Federal Society of Journeymen Cordwainers in Philadelphia, and of the printers in New York and other East Coast cities. Various trade and craft groups had come and gone since then, some strong and successful, some not. They were always opposed by owners, and the owners always managed to keep the law and public opinion on their side.
Never had it been more true than in 1806, when eight Philadelphia cordwainers had turned out—struck—for a pay raise of twenty-five cents per pair of boots made. To the alarmed public, the eight were the harbingers of anarchy. To the leather shop owners, they were an economic threat. And to the courts dominated by the Federalists, who drew their political support from the owner class, the eight were men who had t
o be punished. Thus the doctrine of a strike as a criminal conspiracy had first been invoked. The Philadelphia eight had been fined, and jailed until the fines were paid.
As Gideon had observed to Strelnik, the conspiracy doctrine had been overturned in 1842. But it had served for two and a half decades after that as a means of keeping strikes to a minimum, and it was still trotted out whenever some venal judge thought he could get away with it.
Today the cottage industries and the small shops employing a few craftsmen were largely gone. But the conflicts remained—and had even been intensified with the spread of bad working conditions in the dark, dehumanizing factories that made Francis Cabot Lowell’s Waltham system a model of enlightenment. In Massachusetts in 1814, Lowell had created the world’s first textile plant with all operations under one roof. He had been a hard taskmaster, but a concerned one. As his business had prospered, he had cared for his employees with a paternalism that was now legendary—and obsolete.
Lowell had designed his buildings to admit sunlight; the absentee owners of newer factories crammed their buildings together and shut it out. He had done his best to protect the morals of young girls who worked for him. Recently Gideon had heard stories of men in black-painted wagons cruising the New England countryside to debauch girls and get them into the mills once they were stricken with remorse.
The crimes of profit-hungry factory owners and managers ranged from the horrible to the ludicrous. Gideon knew of seven- and eight-year-old children dying of lung disease contracted in airless, sunless workrooms where textile machinery threw off millions of fiber particles. He had gotten reliable reports of mill owners who tinkered with clocks to make them run more slowly. Of supervisors who flogged employees stupid and trusting enough to confess they had eaten breakfast; a popular theory said breakfast made a worker “langorous.”
In the spread of the factory system, he perceived national industries emerging—railroads and textiles and steel to name just three. But he as yet saw no signs of national organizations to effectively represent the workers in those industries. The National Labor Union was really not much more than a debating forum. And he didn’t have much hope for the newest of the organizations, the Knights of Labor, either.
