It was not for himself that he suffered--what did a man who worked in Durham"s fertilizer mill care about anything that the world might do to him! What was any tyranny of prison compared with the tyranny of the past, of the thing that had happened and could not be recalled, of the memory that could never be effaced! The horror of it drove him mad; he stretched out his arms to heaven, crying out for deliverance from it--and there was no deliverance, there was no power even in heaven that could undo the past. It was a ghost that would not drown; it followed him, it seized upon him and beat him to the ground. Ah, if only he could have foreseen it--but then, he would have foreseen it, if he had not been a fool! He smote his hands upon his forehead, cursing himself because he had ever allowed Ona to work where she had, because he had not stood between her and a fate which every one knew to be so common. He should have taken her away, even if it were to lie down and die of starvation in the gutters of Chicago"s streets! And now--oh, it could not be true; it was too monstrous, too horrible.
It was a thing that could not be faced; a new shuddering seized him every time he tried to think of it. No, there was no bearing the load of it, there was no living under it. There would be none for her--he knew that he might pardon her, might plead with her on his knees, but she would never look him in the face again, she would never be his wife again. The shame of it would kill her--there could be no other deliverance, and it was best that she should die.
This was simple and clear, and yet, with cruel inconsistency, whenever he escaped from this nightmare it was to suffer and cry out at the vision of Ona starving. They had put him in jail, and they would keep him here a long time, years maybe. And Ona would surely not go to work again, broken and crushed as she was. And Elzbieta and Marija, too, might lose their places--if that h.e.l.l fiend Connor chose to set to work to ruin them, they would all be turned out. And even if he did not, they could not live--even if the boys left school again, they could surely not pay all the bills without him and Ona. They had only a few dollars now--they had just paid the rent of the house a week ago, and that after it was two weeks overdue. So it would be due again in a week! They would have no money to pay it then--and they would lose the house, after all their long, heartbreaking struggle. Three times now the agent had warned him that he would not tolerate another delay. Perhaps it was very base of Jurgis to be thinking about the house when he had the other unspeakable thing to fill his mind; yet, how much he had suffered for this house, how much they had all of them suffered! It was their one hope of respite, as long as they lived; they had put all their money into it--and they were working people, poor people, whose money was their strength, the very substance of them, body and soul, the thing by which they lived and for lack of which they died.
And they would lose it all; they would be turned out into the streets, and have to hide in some icy garret, and live or die as best they could! Jurgis had all the night--and all of many more nights--to think about this, and he saw the thing in its details; he lived it all, as if he were there. They would sell their furniture, and then run into debt at the stores, and then be refused credit; they would borrow a little from the Szedvilases, whose delicatessen store was tottering on the brink of ruin; the neighbors would come and help them a little--poor, sick Jadvyga would bring a few spare pennies, as she always did when people were starving, and Tamoszius Kuszleika would bring them the proceeds of a night"s fiddling. So they would struggle to hang on until he got out of jail--or would they know that he was in jail, would they be able to find out anything about him? Would they be allowed to see him--or was it to be part of his punishment to be kept in ignorance about their fate?
His mind would hang upon the worst possibilities; he saw Ona ill and tortured, Marija out of her place, little Stanislovas unable to get to work for the snow, the whole family turned out on the street. G.o.d Almighty! would they actually let them lie down in the street and die? Would there be no help even then--would they wander about in the snow till they froze? Jurgis had never seen any dead bodies in the streets, but he had seen people evicted and disappear, no one knew where; and though the city had a relief bureau, though there was a charity organization society in the stockyards district, in all his life there he had never heard of either of them. They did not advertise their activities, having more calls than they could attend to without that.
--So on until morning. Then he had another ride in the patrol wagon, along with the drunken wife-beater and the maniac, several "plain drunks" and "saloon fighters," a burglar, and two men who had been arrested for stealing meat from the packing houses. Along with them he was driven into a large, white-walled room, stale-smelling and crowded. In front, upon a raised platform behind a rail, sat a stout, florid-faced personage, with a nose broken out in purple blotches.
Our friend realized vaguely that he was about to be tried. He wondered what for--whether or not his victim might be dead, and if so, what they would do with him. Hang him, perhaps, or beat him to death--nothing would have surprised Jurgis, who knew little of the laws. Yet he had picked up gossip enough to have it occur to him that the loud-voiced man upon the bench might be the notorious Justice Callahan, about whom the people of Packingtown spoke with bated breath.
"Pat" Callahan--"Growler" Pat, as he had been known before he ascended the bench--had begun life as a butcher boy and a bruiser of local reputation; he had gone into politics almost as soon as he had learned to talk, and had held two offices at once before he was old enough to vote. If Scully was the thumb, Pat Callahan was the first finger of the unseen hand whereby the packers held down the people of the district. No politician in Chicago ranked higher in their confidence; he had been at it a long time--had been the business agent in the city council of old Durham, the self-made merchant, way back in the early days, when the whole city of Chicago had been up at auction. "Growler" Pat had given up holding city offices very early in his career--caring only for party power, and giving the rest of his time to superintending his dives and brothels. Of late years, however, since his children were growing up, he had begun to value respectability, and had had himself made a magistrate; a position for which he was admirably fitted, because of his strong conservatism and his contempt for "foreigners."
Jurgis sat gazing about the room for an hour or two; he was in hopes that some one of the family would come, but in this he was disappointed. Finally, he was led before the bar, and a lawyer for the company appeared against him. Connor was under the doctor"s care, the lawyer explained briefly, and if his Honor would hold the prisoner for a week--"Three hundred dollars," said his Honor, promptly.
Jurgis was staring from the judge to the lawyer in perplexity. "Have you any one to go on your bond?" demanded the judge, and then a clerk who stood at Jurgis" elbow explained to him what this meant. The latter shook his head, and before he realized what had happened the policemen were leading him away again. They took him to a room where other prisoners were waiting and here he stayed until court adjourned, when he had another long and bitterly cold ride in a patrol wagon to the county jail, which is on the north side of the city, and nine or ten miles from the stockyards.
Here they searched Jurgis, leaving him only his money, which consisted of fifteen cents. Then they led him to a room and told him to strip for a bath; after which he had to walk down a long gallery, past the grated cell doors of the inmates of the jail. This was a great event to the latter--the daily review of the new arrivals, all stark naked, and many and diverting were the comments. Jurgis was required to stay in the bath longer than any one, in the vain hope of getting out of him a few of his phosphates and acids. The prisoners roomed two in a cell, but that day there was one left over, and he was the one.
The cells were in tiers, opening upon galleries. His cell was about five feet by seven in size, with a stone floor and a heavy wooden bench built into it. There was no window--the only light came from windows near the roof at one end of the court outside. There were two bunks, one above the other, each with a straw mattress and a pair of gray blankets--the latter stiff as boards with filth, and alive with fleas, bedbugs, and lice. When Jurgis lifted up the mattress he discovered beneath it a layer of scurrying roaches, almost as badly frightened as himself.
Here they brought him more "duffers and dope," with the addition of a bowl of soup. Many of the prisoners had their meals brought in from a restaurant, but Jurgis had no money for that. Some had books to read and cards to play, with candles to burn by night, but Jurgis was all alone in darkness and silence. He could not sleep again; there was the same maddening procession of thoughts that lashed him like whips upon his naked back. When night fell he was pacing up and down his cell like a wild beast that breaks its teeth upon the bars of its cage. Now and then in his frenzy he would fling himself against the walls of the place, beating his hands upon them. They cut him and bruised him--they were cold and merciless as the men who had built them.
In the distance there was a church-tower bell that tolled the hours one by one. When it came to midnight Jurgis was lying upon the floor with his head in his arms, listening. Instead of falling silent at the end, the bell broke into a sudden clangor. Jurgis raised his head; what could that mean--a fire? G.o.d! Suppose there were to be a fire in this jail! But then he made out a melody in the ringing; there were chimes. And they seemed to waken the city--all around, far and near, there were bells, ringing wild music; for fully a minute Jurgis lay lost in wonder, before, all at once, the meaning of it broke over him--that this was Christmas Eve!
Christmas Eve--he had forgotten it entirely! There was a breaking of floodgates, a whirl of new memories and new griefs rushing into his mind. In far Lithuania they had celebrated Christmas; and it came to him as if it had been yesterday--himself a little child, with his lost brother and his dead father in the cabin--in the deep black forest, where the snow fell all day and all night and buried them from the world. It was too far off for Santa Claus in Lithuania, but it was not too far for peace and good will to men, for the wonder-bearing vision of the Christ Child. And even in Packingtown they had not forgotten it--some gleam of it had never failed to break their darkness. Last Christmas Eve and all Christmas Day Jurgis had toiled on the killing beds, and Ona at wrapping hams, and still they had found strength enough to take the children for a walk upon the avenue, to see the store windows all decorated with Christmas trees and ablaze with electric lights. In one window there would be live geese, in another marvels in sugar--pink and white canes big enough for ogres, and cakes with cherubs upon them; in a third there would be rows of fat yellow turkeys, decorated with rosettes, and rabbits and squirrels hanging; in a fourth would be a fairyland of toys--lovely dolls with pink dresses, and woolly sheep and drums and soldier hats. Nor did they have to go without their share of all this, either. The last time they had had a big basket with them and all their Christmas marketing to do--a roast of pork and a cabbage and some rye bread, and a pair of mittens for Ona, and a rubber doll that squeaked, and a little green cornucopia full of candy to be hung from the gas jet and gazed at by half a dozen pairs of longing eyes.
Even half a year of the sausage machines and the fertilizer mill had not been able to kill the thought of Christmas in them; there was a choking in Jurgis" throat as he recalled that the very night Ona had not come home Teta Elzbieta had taken him aside and shown him an old valentine that she had picked up in a paper store for three cents--dingy and shopworn, but with bright colors, and figures of angels and doves. She had wiped all the specks off this, and was going to set it on the mantel, where the children could see it. Great sobs shook Jurgis at this memory--they would spend their Christmas in misery and despair, with him in prison and Ona ill and their home in desolation. Ah, it was too cruel! Why at least had they not left him alone--why, after they had shut him in jail, must they be ringing Christmas chimes in his ears!
But no, their bells were not ringing for him--their Christmas was not meant for him, they were simply not counting him at all. He was of no consequence--he was flung aside, like a bit of trash, the carca.s.s of some animal. It was horrible, horrible! His wife might be dying, his baby might be starving, his whole family might be perishing in the cold--and all the while they were ringing their Christmas chimes! And the bitter mockery of it--all this was punishment for him! They put him in a place where the snow could not beat in, where the cold could not eat through his bones; they brought him food and drink--why, in the name of heaven, if they must punish him, did they not put his family in jail and leave him outside--why could they find no better way to punish him than to leave three weak women and six helpless children to starve and freeze? That was their law, that was their justice!
Jurgis stood upright; trembling with pa.s.sion, his hands clenched and his arms upraised, his whole soul ablaze with hatred and defiance. Ten thousand curses upon them and their law! Their justice--it was a lie, it was a lie, a hideous, brutal lie, a thing too black and hateful for any world but a world of nightmares. It was a sham and a loathsome mockery. There was no justice, there was no right, anywhere in it--it was only force, it was tyranny, the will and the power, reckless and unrestrained! They had ground him beneath their heel, they had devoured all his substance; they had murdered his old father, they had broken and wrecked his wife, they had crushed and cowed his whole family; and now they were through with him, they had no further use for him--and because he had interfered with them, had gotten in their way, this was what they had done to him! They had put him behind bars, as if he had been a wild beast, a thing without sense or reason, without rights, without affections, without feelings. Nay, they would not even have treated a beast as they had treated him! Would any man in his senses have trapped a wild thing in its lair, and left its young behind to die?
These midnight hours were fateful ones to Jurgis; in them was the beginning of his rebellion, of his outlawry and his unbelief. He had no wit to trace back the social crime to its far sources--he could not say that it was the thing men have called "the system" that was crushing him to the earth; that it was the packers, his masters, who had bought up the law of the land, and had dealt out their brutal will to him from the seat of justice. He only knew that he was wronged, and that the world had wronged him; that the law, that society, with all its powers, had declared itself his foe. And every hour his soul grew blacker, every hour he dreamed new dreams of vengeance, of defiance, of raging, frenzied hate.
The vilest deeds, like poison weeds, Bloom well in prison air; It is only what is good in Man That wastes and withers there; Pale Anguish keeps the heavy gate, And the Warder is Despair.
So wrote a poet, to whom the world had dealt its justice-- I know not whether Laws be right, Or whether Laws be wrong; All that we know who lie in gaol Is that the wall is strong. And they do well to hide their h.e.l.l, For in it things are done That Son of G.o.d nor son of Man Ever should look upon!
Chapter 17.
At seven o"clock the next morning Jurgis was let out to get water to wash his cell--a duty which he performed faithfully, but which most of the prisoners were accustomed to shirk, until their cells became so filthy that the guards interposed. Then he had more "duffers and dope," and afterward was allowed three hours for exercise, in a long, cement-walked court roofed with gla.s.s. Here were all the inmates of the jail crowded together. At one side of the court was a place for visitors, cut off by two heavy wire screens, a foot apart, so that nothing could be pa.s.sed in to the prisoners; here Jurgis watched anxiously, but there came no one to see him.
Soon after he went back to his cell, a keeper opened the door to let in another prisoner. He was a dapper young fellow, with a light brown mustache and blue eyes, and a graceful figure. He nodded to Jurgis, and then, as the keeper closed the door upon him, began gazing critically about him.
"Well, pal," he said, as his glance encountered Jurgis again, "good morning."
"Good morning," said Jurgis.
"A rum go for Christmas, eh?" added the other.
Jurgis nodded.
The newcomer went to the bunks and inspected the blankets; he lifted up the mattress, and then dropped it with an exclamation. "My G.o.d!" he said, "that"s the worst yet."
He glanced at Jurgis again. "Looks as if it hadn"t been slept in last night. Couldn"t stand it, eh?"
"I didn"t want to sleep last night," said Jurgis.
"When did you come in?"
"Yesterday."
The other had another look around, and then wrinkled up his nose. "There"s the devil of a stink in here," he said, suddenly. "What is it?"
"It"s me," said Jurgis.
"You?"
"Yes, me."
"Didn"t they make you wash?"
"Yes, but this don"t wash."
"What is it?"
"Fertilizer."
"Fertilizer! The deuce! What are you?"
"I work in the stockyards--at least I did until the other day. It"s in my clothes."
"That"s a new one on me," said the newcomer. "I thought I"d been up against "em all. What are you in for?"
"I hit my boss."
"Oh--that"s it. What did he do?"
"He--he treated me mean."
"I see. You"re what"s called an honest workingman!"
"What are you?" Jurgis asked.
"I?" The other laughed. "They say I"m a cracksman," he said.
"What"s that?" asked Jurgis.
"Safes, and such things," answered the other.
"Oh," said Jurgis, wonderingly, and stated at the speaker in awe. "You mean you break into them--you--you--"
"Yes," laughed the other, "that"s what they say."
He did not look to be over twenty-two or three, though, as Jurgis found afterward, he was thirty. He spoke like a man of education, like what the world calls a "gentleman."
"Is that what you"re here for?" Jurgis inquired.
"No," was the answer. "I"m here for disorderly conduct. They were mad because they couldn"t get any evidence.
"What"s your name?" the young fellow continued after a pause. "My name"s Duane--Jack Duane. I"ve more than a dozen, but that"s my company one." He seated himself on the floor with his back to the wall and his legs crossed, and went on talking easily; he soon put Jurgis on a friendly footing--he was evidently a man of the world, used to getting on, and not too proud to hold conversation with a mere laboring man. He drew Jurgis out, and heard all about his life all but the one unmentionable thing; and then he told stories about his own life. He was a great one for stories, not always of the choicest. Being sent to jail had apparently not disturbed his cheerfulness; he had "done time" twice before, it seemed, and he took it all with a frolic welcome. What with women and wine and the excitement of his vocation, a man could afford to rest now and then.
Naturally, the aspect of prison life was changed for Jurgis by the arrival of a cell mate. He could not turn his face to the wall and sulk, he had to speak when he was spoken to; nor could he help being interested in the conversation of Duane--the first educated man with whom he had ever talked. How could he help listening with wonder while the other told of midnight ventures and perilous escapes, of feastings and orgies, of fortunes squandered in a night? The young fellow had an amused contempt for Jurgis, as a sort of working mule; he, too, had felt the world"s injustice, but instead of bearing it patiently, he had struck back, and struck hard. He was striking all the time--there was war between him and society. He was a genial freebooter, living off the enemy, without fear or shame. He was not always victorious, but then defeat did not mean annihilation, and need not break his spirit.
Withal he was a goodhearted fellow--too much so, it appeared. His story came out, not in the first day, nor the second, but in the long hours that dragged by, in which they had nothing to do but talk and nothing to talk of but themselves. Jack Duane was from the East; he was a college-bred man--had been studying electrical engineering. Then his father had met with misfortune in business and killed himself; and there had been his mother and a younger brother and sister. Also, there was an invention of Duane"s; Jurgis could not understand it clearly, but it had to do with telegraphing, and it was a very important thing--there were fortunes in it, millions upon millions of dollars. And Duane had been robbed of it by a great company, and got tangled up in lawsuits and lost all his money. Then somebody had given him a tip on a horse race, and he had tried to retrieve his fortune with another person"s money, and had to run away, and all the rest had come from that. The other asked him what had led him to safe-breaking--to Jurgis a wild and appalling occupation to think about. A man he had met, his cell mate had replied--one thing leads to another. Didn"t he ever wonder about his family, Jurgis asked. Sometimes, the other answered, but not often--he didn"t allow it. Thinking about it would make it no better. This wasn"t a world in which a man had any business with a family; sooner or later Jurgis would find that out also, and give up the fight and shift for himself.
Jurgis was so transparently what he pretended to be that his cell mate was as open with him as a child; it was pleasant to tell him adventures, he was so full of wonder and admiration, he was so new to the ways of the country. Duane did not even bother to keep back names and places--he told all his triumphs and his failures, his loves and his griefs. Also he introduced Jurgis to many of the other prisoners, nearly half of whom he knew by name. The crowd had already given Jurgis a name--they called him "he stinker." This was cruel, but they meant no harm by it, and he took it with a good-natured grin.
Our friend had caught now and then a whiff from the sewers over which he lived, but this was the first time that he had ever been splashed by their filth. This jail was a Noah"s ark of the city"s crime--there were murderers, "hold-up men" and burglars, embezzlers, counterfeiters and forgers, bigamists, "shoplifters," "confidence men," petty thieves and pickpockets, gamblers and procurers, brawlers, beggars, tramps and drunkards; they were black and white, old and young, Americans and natives of every nation under the sun. There were hardened criminals and innocent men too poor to give bail; old men, and boys literally not yet in their teens. They were the drainage of the great festering ulcer of society; they were hideous to look upon, sickening to talk to. All life had turned to rottenness and stench in them--love was a beastliness, joy was a snare, and G.o.d was an imprecation. They strolled here and there about the courtyard, and Jurgis listened to them. He was ignorant and they were wise; they had been everywhere and tried everything. They could tell the whole hateful story of it, set forth the inner soul of a city in which justice and honor, women"s bodies and men"s souls, were for sale in the marketplace, and human beings writhed and fought and fell upon each other like wolves in a pit; in which l.u.s.ts were raging fires, and men were fuel, and humanity was festering and stewing and wallowing in its own corruption. Into this wild-beast tangle these men had been born without their consent, they had taken part in it because they could not help it; that they were in jail was no disgrace to them, for the game had never been fair, the dice were loaded. They were swindlers and thieves of pennies and dimes, and they had been trapped and put out of the way by the swindlers and thieves of millions of dollars.
To most of this Jurgis tried not to listen. They frightened him with their savage mockery; and all the while his heart was far away, where his loved ones were calling. Now and then in the midst of it his thoughts would take flight; and then the tears would come into his eyes--and he would be called back by the jeering laughter of his companions.
He spent a week in this company, and during all that time he had no word from his home. He paid one of his fifteen cents for a postal card, and his companion wrote a note to the family, telling them where he was and when he would be tried. There came no answer to it, however, and at last, the day before New Year"s, Jurgis bade good-by to Jack Duane. The latter gave him his address, or rather the address of his mistress, and made Jurgis promise to look him up. "Maybe I could help you out of a hole some day," he said, and added that he was sorry to have him go. Jurgis rode in the patrol wagon back to Justice Callahan"s court for trial.
One of the first things he made out as he entered the room was Teta Elzbieta and little Kotrina, looking pale and frightened, seated far in the rear. His heart began to pound, but he did not dare to try to signal to them, and neither did Elzbieta. He took his seat in the prisoners" pen and sat gazing at them in helpless agony. He saw that Ona was not with them, and was full of foreboding as to what that might mean. He spent half an hour brooding over this--and then suddenly he straightened up and the blood rushed into his face. A man had come in--Jurgis could not see his features for the bandages that swathed him, but he knew the burly figure. It was Connor! A trembling seized him, and his limbs bent as if for a spring. Then suddenly he felt a hand on his collar, and heard a voice behind him: "Sit down, you son of a--!"
He subsided, but he never took his eyes off his enemy. The fellow was still alive, which was a disappointment, in one way; and yet it was pleasant to see him, all in penitential plasters. He and the company lawyer, who was with him, came and took seats within the judge"s railing; and a minute later the clerk called Jurgis" name, and the policeman jerked him to his feet and led him before the bar, gripping him tightly by the arm, lest he should spring upon the boss.
Jurgis listened while the man entered the witness chair, took the oath, and told his story. The wife of the prisoner had been employed in a department near him, and had been discharged for impudence to him. Half an hour later he had been violently attacked, knocked down, and almost choked to death. He had brought witnesses-- "They will probably not be necessary," observed the judge and he turned to Jurgis. "You admit attacking the plaintiff?" he asked.
"Him?" inquired Jurgis, pointing at the boss.
"Yes," said the judge. "I hit him, sir," said Jurgis.
"Say "your Honor,"" said the officer, pinching his arm hard.
"Your Honor," said Jurgis, obediently.
"You tried to choke him?"
"Yes, sir, your Honor."
"Ever been arrested before?"
"No, sir, your Honor."
"What have you to say for yourself?"
Jurgis hesitated. What had he to say? In two years and a half he had learned to speak English for practical purposes, but these had never included the statement that some one had intimidated and seduced his wife. He tried once or twice, stammering and balking, to the annoyance of the judge, who was gasping from the odor of fertilizer. Finally, the prisoner made it understood that his vocabulary was inadequate, and there stepped up a dapper young man with waxed mustaches, bidding him speak in any language he knew.
Jurgis began; supposing that he would be given time, he explained how the boss had taken advantage of his wife"s position to make advances to her and had threatened her with the loss of her place. When the interpreter had translated this, the judge, whose calendar was crowded, and whose automobile was ordered for a certain hour, interrupted with the remark: "Oh, I see. Well, if he made love to your wife, why didn"t she complain to the superintendent or leave the place?"
Jurgis hesitated, somewhat taken aback; he began to explain that they were very poor--that work was hard to get-- "I see," said Justice Callahan; "so instead you thought you would knock him down." He turned to the plaintiff, inquiring, "Is there any truth in this story, Mr. Connor?"
"Not a particle, your Honor," said the boss. "It is very unpleasant--they tell some such tale every time you have to discharge a woman--"
"Yes, I know," said the judge. "I hear it often enough. The fellow seems to have handled you pretty roughly. Thirty days and costs. Next case."
Jurgis had been listening in perplexity. It was only when the policeman who had him by the arm turned and started to lead him away that he realized that sentence had been pa.s.sed. He gazed round him wildly. "Thirty days!" he panted and then he whirled upon the judge. "What will my family do?" he cried frantically. "I have a wife and baby, sir, and they have no money--my G.o.d, they will starve to death!"
"You would have done well to think about them before you committed the a.s.sault," said the judge dryly, as he turned to look at the next prisoner.
Jurgis would have spoken again, but the policeman had seized him by the collar and was twisting it, and a second policeman was making for him with evidently hostile intentions. So he let them lead him away. Far down the room he saw Elzbieta and Kotrina, risen from their seats, staring in fright; he made one effort to go to them, and then, brought back by another twist at his throat, he bowed his head and gave up the struggle. They thrust him into a cell room, where other prisoners were waiting; and as soon as court had adjourned they led him down with them into the "Black Maria," and drove him away.
This time Jurgis was bound for the "Bridewell," a petty jail where Cook County prisoners serve their time. It was even filthier and more crowded than the county jail; all the smaller fry out of the latter had been sifted into it--the petty thieves and swindlers, the brawlers and vagrants. For his cell mate Jurgis had an Italian fruit seller who had refused to pay his graft to the policeman, and been arrested for carrying a large pocketknife; as he did not understand a word of English our friend was glad when he left. He gave place to a Norwegian sailor, who had lost half an ear in a drunken brawl, and who proved to be quarrelsome, cursing Jurgis because he moved in his bunk and caused the roaches to drop upon the lower one. It would have been quite intolerable, staying in a cell with this wild beast, but for the fact that all day long the prisoners were put at work breaking stone.
Ten days of his thirty Jurgis spent thus, without hearing a word from his family; then one day a keeper came and informed him that there was a visitor to see him. Jurgis turned white, and so weak at the knees that he could hardly leave his cell.
The man led him down the corridor and a flight of steps to the visitors" room, which was barred like a cell. Through the grating Jurgis could see some one sitting in a chair; and as he came into the room the person started up, and he saw that it was little Stanislovas. At the sight of some one from home the big fellow nearly went to pieces--he had to steady himself by a chair, and he put his other hand to his forehead, as if to clear away a mist. "Well?" he said, weakly.
Little Stanislovas was also trembling, and all but too frightened to speak. "They--they sent me to tell you--" he said, with a gulp.
"Well?" Jurgis repeated. He followed the boy"s glance to where the keeper was standing watching them. "Never mind that," Jurgis cried, wildly. "How are they?"
"Ona is very sick," Stanislovas said; "and we are almost starving. We can"t get along; we thought you might be able to help us."
Jurgis gripped the chair tighter; there were beads of perspiration on his forehead, and his hand shook. "I--can"t help you," he said.
"Ona lies in her room all day," the boy went on, breathlessly. "She won"t eat anything, and she cries all the time. She won"t tell what is the matter and she won"t go to work at all. Then a long time ago the man came for the rent. He was very cross. He came again last week. He said he would turn us out of the house. And then Marija--"
A sob choked Stanislovas, and he stopped. "What"s the matter with Marija?" cried Jurgis.
"She"s cut her hand!" said the boy. "She"s cut it bad, this time, worse than before. She can"t work and it"s all turning green, and the company doctor says she may--she may have to have it cut off. And Marija cries all the time--her money is nearly all gone, too, and we can"t pay the rent and the interest on the house; and we have no coal and nothing more to eat, and the man at the store, he says--"
The little fellow stopped again, beginning to whimper. "Go on!" the other panted in frenzy--"Go on!"
"I--I will," sobbed Stanislovas. "It"s so--so cold all the time. And last Sunday it snowed again--a deep, deep snow--and I couldn"t--couldn"t get to work."