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“I can do it just fine from in here,” Bleecher said from his rifle sight. “Something about this stinks. Murphy would make us come to him in this piss.”
By fully extending my ears and concentrating, I could just hear Murphy. “Barnesworth, you have to help me,” Murphy said. “Everyone’s got to come out of the mine. Today, within the hour.”
Barnesworth said something in return, but it was lost in the drizzle. He was facing the other way.
“He’s wired! Explosives!”
“No, let—,” Murphy began.
Barnesworth made it two steps before disappearing in a boiling mist of fire and fleshy debris. The concussion shattered windows already pierced and spiderwebbed by bullets.
A messy trail of pieces of Barnesworth lay on a path to the mine.
• • •
“We should send Prapa out,” Longliner said.
“Are you nuts?”
“Prapa?”
“You were the one who wanted to take him hostage in the first place.”
“No, the kid’s got a point,” Bleecher said, eye still aligned on his sight. “It’s the mine that’s important. Prapa’s just a functionary. He’ll sound every gong in hell to get us working again. It’s his position on the line, too.”
Jones stood behind Prapa with hands on the ropes around his wrists. “Okay, Mr. Director Prapa, we have two demands. First, back to the understanding that nobody who works in the mine gets repurposed. We understand accident and injury and all that, but working in the dark and the dust ought to earn us some privileges. Second, we want Aym back if she’s still alive. Everything goes back to normal.”
“How about no more Grogs doing mine work?” Pelloponensis said.
“Best thing to do is walk out behind me quietly,” Prapa said. “That’s your only chance of resolving this and getting things back to normal. Right now, it’s a Coal Country matter. I bet no one outside the White Palace knows about it. But if word of this strike spreads out of Number Four . . . your lives won’t be worth spit. No repurposing—they’ll just come in and kill you.”
“This is Boss Murphy, guys. Let’s stop this nonsense now. Prapa is a jackoff—you know it; I know it; the folks at the White Palace know it. He’s done.”
“We’re dead men,” Sikorsky said. “Sure as shit.”
“Old thumbs there is right,” Pelloponensis said.
“Let’s not give them the satisfaction. Let’s blow this mine to hell and all of us with it,” Sikorsky said.
“Just how will you do that, wiseass?” Pelloponensis said.
“Easy. Mess a little with the ventilators and kick up enough coal dust to fill Broadway. Touch it off with naked flame or some blasting caps.”
“Let’s not go crazy here. Like the man said, this is still fixable,” Longliner said.
“Says the man who said we need fast, direct action.”
“He was taking hemorrhoid cures, I bet,” Pelloponensis said.
“Anyone going to ask the stoop’s opinion?”
“No fight. Work hard,” I said.
“Anyone who trusts these jackholes, feel free to walk out behind Prapa,” Sikorsky said. “I’m not going to be around when the music stops. Let the Hoods yank some pieces off you. I’m staying put.”
“Hey, guys, it’s me,” Galloway said through the megaphone. “Prapa—he’s . . . he’s gone. Yeah, they took care of him permanently. A—a representative from on high is here, and he’s saying that he’s done with these games. The mine needs to go back up, right now. All we have to do is say that it was a big misunderstanding, that we weren’t on strike or anything, that it was a broken shaft elevator and power loss. We say that on the radio and everything’s good. No more Prapa, either.”
Nobody moved, but they still listened intently.
