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“The firemen are on their way!”
“Jesus, Rage, what have you done?”
“They won’t do shit. Not while we have the mine. Prapa, too.”
“There’s more coal where that came from, numbnuts. We’re not even ten percent of production. All they have to do is add another shift at Fourteen and it’ll more than make up for us.”
“They called the firemen? On us?”
“We should send a messenger. Offer.”
“Yeah, and get shot in the leg for it.”
“I know,” Pelloponensis said. “We could tie a message around the Grog’s neck and send him out. Not like one of us getting shot.” He didn’t bother to lower his voice or speak as an aside, as an older sibling might when proposing a trick on his uncomprehending younger sibling.
They had the fire trucks parked blocking the road down to the housing.
I counted fifteen rifles pointed at me. If something went wrong, I’d be dead before I heard the sound of the shots.
“Me messenger,” I said.
“Bring it. Slowly.”
I took robotic steps forward, pausing every time a foot touched or left the ground.
A fireman with captain’s bars read the note. “They have Prapa. They want one of their workers back. Taken last night.”
The firemen were no more afraid to talk in front of me than the miners inside. The thought flashed across my mind that dogs understand a lot more than they let on; they just think it’s politic not to react.
Number Four mine is on strike. We protest the removal of our break attendant, Aym Swanson.
We have Director Prapa and Foreman Bleecher under guard. No harm will come to them for the duration of the st
rike. We retain them only to prevent a seizure of the mine by force.
The mine, equipment, and supporting buildings have been wired with explosives. Any attempt to remove us by force will result in the destruction of the mine, machinery, buildings, and, of course, ourselves.
Our only demand is the return of Aym Swanson to her duties.
• • •
• • •
The next day it rained, hard, turning most of the open ground at Number Four to mud.
“Ahh. Listen, you. I’m . . . coming. Coming in to talk over your demands.”
It was Murphy’s voice, cracking and hesitant, over the bullhorn.
Murphy was shaking all over and greasy with sweat. Something was wrong beyond the exertion of crossing Number Four’s front yard.
A figure in one of the standard firemen’s black-and-yellow raincoats stepped carefully across the mud.
“That’s Fatty, all right.”
“I’ll go out and check him,” Barnesworth said. “I know him better than any of you.”
“Bleecher, go out and cover him.”
