Chapter 25

by Upton Sinclair

　　Jurgis got up, wild with rage, but the door was shut and thegreat castle was dark and impregnable. Then the icy teeth of theblast bit into him, and he turned and went away at a run.When he stopped again it was because he was coming to frequentedstreets and did not wish to attract attention. In spite of thatlast humiliation, his heart was thumping fast with triumph.He had come out ahead on that deal! He put his hand into histrousers' pocket every now and then, to make sure that theprecious hundred-dollar bill was still there.Yet he was in a plight--a curious and even dreadful plight, whenhe came to realize it. He had not a single cent but that onebill! And he had to find some shelter that night he had tochange it!Jurgis spent half an hour walking and debating the problem.There was no one he could go to for help--he had to manage it allalone. To get it changed in a lodging-house would be to take hislife in his hands--he would almost certainly be robbed, andperhaps murdered, before morning. He might go to some hotel orrailroad depot and ask to have it changed; but what would theythink, seeing a "bum" like him with a hundred dollars? He wouldprobably be arrested if he tried it; and what story could hetell? On the morrow Freddie Jones would discover his loss,and there would be a hunt for him, and he would lose his money.The only other plan he could think of was to try in a saloon.He might pay them to change it, if it could not be done otherwise.He began peering into places as he walked; he passed several asbeing too crowded--then finally, chancing upon one where thebartender was all alone, he gripped his hands in suddenresolution and went in."Can you change me a hundred-dollar bill?" he demanded.The bartender was a big, husky fellow, with the jaw of a prizefighter, and a three weeks' stubble of hair upon it. He staredat Jurgis. "What's that youse say?" he demanded."I said, could you change me a hundred-dollar bill?""Where'd youse get it?" he inquired incredulously."Never mind," said Jurgis; "I've got it, and I want it changed.I'll pay you if you'll do it."The other stared at him hard. "Lemme see it," he said."Will you change it?" Jurgis demanded, gripping it tightly in hispocket."How the hell can I know if it's good or not?" retorted thebartender. "Whatcher take me for, hey?"Then Jurgis slowly and warily approached him; he took out thebill, and fumbled it for a moment, while the man stared at himwith hostile eyes across the counter. Then finally he handed itover.The other took it, and began to examine it; he smoothed itbetween his fingers, and held it up to the light; he turned itover, and upside down, and edgeways. It was new and ratherstiff, and that made him dubious. Jurgis was watching him like acat all the time."Humph," he said, finally, and gazed at the stranger, sizing himup--a ragged, ill-smelling tramp, with no overcoat and one arm ina sling--and a hundred-dollar bill! "Want to buy anything?" hedemanded."Yes," said Jurgis, "I'll take a glass of beer.""All right," said the other, "I'll change it." And he put thebill in his pocket, and poured Jurgis out a glass of beer,and set it on the counter. Then he turned to the cash register,and punched up five cents, and began to pull money out of the drawer.Finally, he faced Jurgis, counting it out--two dimes, a quarter,and fifty cents. "There," he said.For a second Jurgis waited, expecting to see him turn again. "Myninety-nine dollars," he said."What ninety-nine dollars?" demanded the bartender."My change!" he cried--"the rest of my hundred!""Go on," said the bartender, "you're nutty!"And Jurgis stared at him with wild eyes. For an instant horrorreigned in him--black, paralyzing, awful horror, clutching him atthe heart; and then came rage, in surging, blinding floods--he screamed aloud, and seized the glass and hurled it at the other'shead. The man ducked, and it missed him by half an inch; he roseagain and faced Jurgis, who was vaulting over the bar with hisone well arm, and dealt him a smashing blow in the face, hurlinghim backward upon the floor. Then, as Jurgis scrambled to hisfeet again and started round the counter after him, he shouted atthe top of his voice, "Help! help!"Jurgis seized a bottle off the counter as he ran; and as thebartender made a leap he hurled the missile at him with all hisforce. It just grazed his head, and shivered into a thousandpieces against the post of the door. Then Jurgis started back,rushing at the man again in the middle of the room. This time,in his blind frenzy, he came without a bottle, and that was allthe bartender wanted--he met him halfway and floored him with asledgehammer drive between the eyes. An instant later the screendoors flew open, and two men rushed in--just as Jurgis wasgetting to his feet again, foaming at the mouth with rage,and trying to tear his broken arm out of its bandages."Look out!" shouted the bartender. "He's got a knife!" Then,seeing that the two were disposed to join the fray, he madeanother rush at Jurgis, and knocked aside his feeble defense andsent him tumbling again; and the three flung themselves upon him,rolling and kicking about the place.A second later a policeman dashed in, and the bartender yelledonce more--"Look out for his knife!" Jurgis had fought himselfhalf to his knees, when the policeman made a leap at him, andcracked him across the face with his club. Though the blowstaggered him, the wild-beast frenzy still blazed in him, and hegot to his feet, lunging into the air. Then again the clubdescended, full upon his head, and he dropped like a log to thefloor. The policeman crouched over him, clutching his stick, waiting forhim to try to rise again; and meantime the barkeeper got up, andput his hand to his head. "Christ!" he said, "I thought I wasdone for that time. Did he cut me?""Don't see anything, Jake," said the policeman. "What's thematter with him?""Just crazy drunk," said the other. "A lame duck, too--but he'most got me under the bar. Youse had better call the wagon,Billy.""No," said the officer. "He's got no more fight in him, Iguess--and he's only got a block to go." He twisted his hand inJurgis's collar and jerked at him. "Git up here, you!" hecommanded.But Jurgis did not move, and the bartender went behind the bar,and after stowing the hundred-dollar bill away in a safe hidingplace, came and poured a glass of water over Jurgis. Then, asthe latter began to moan feebly, the policeman got him to hisfeet and dragged him out of the place. The station house wasjust around the corner, and so in a few minutes Jurgis was in acell.He spent half the night lying unconscious, and the balancemoaning in torment, with a blinding headache and a rackingthirst. Now and then he cried aloud for a drink of water,but there was no one to hear him. There were others in that samestation house with split heads and a fever; there were hundredsof them in the great city, and tens of thousands of them in thegreat land, and there was no one to hear any of them.In the morning Jurgis was given a cup of water and a piece ofbread, and then hustled into a patrol wagon and driven to thenearest police court. He sat in the pen with a score of othersuntil his turn came.The bartender--who proved to be a well-known bruiser--was calledto the stand, He took the oath and told his story. The prisonerhad come into his saloon after midnight, fighting drunk, and hadordered a glass of beer and tendered a dollar bill in payment.He had been given ninety-five cents' change, and had demandedninety-nine dollars more, and before the plaintiff could evenanswer had hurled the glass at him and then attacked him with abottle of bitters, and nearly wrecked the place.Then the prisoner was sworn--a forlorn object, haggard andunshorn, with an arm done up in a filthy bandage, a cheek andhead cut, and bloody, and one eye purplish black and entirelyclosed. "What have you to say for yourself?" queried themagistrate."Your Honor," said Jurgis, "I went into his place and asked theman if he could change me a hundred-dollar bill. And he said hewould if I bought a drink. I gave him the bill and then hewouldn't give me the change."The magistrate was staring at him in perplexity. "You gave him ahundred-dollar bill!" he exclaimed."Yes, your Honor," said Jurgis."Where did you get it?""A man gave it to me, your Honor.""A man? What man, and what for?""A young man I met upon the street, your Honor. I had beenbegging."There was a titter in the courtroom; the officer who was holdingJurgis put up his hand to hide a smile, and the magistrate smiledwithout trying to hide it. "It's true, your Honor!" criedJurgis, passionately."You had been drinking as well as begging last night, had younot?" inquired the magistrate. "No, your Honor--" protestedJurgis. "I--""You had not had anything to drink?""Why, yes, your Honor, I had--""What did you have?""I had a bottle of something--I don't know what it was--somethingthat burned--"There was again a laugh round the courtroom, stopping suddenly asthe magistrate looked up and frowned. "Have you ever beenarrested before?" he asked abruptly.The question took Jurgis aback. "I--I--" he stammered."Tell me the truth, now!" commanded the other, sternly."Yes, your Honor," said Jurgis."How often?""Only once, your Honor.""What for?""For knocking down my boss, your Honor. I was working in thestockyards, and he--""I see," said his Honor; "I guess that will do. You ought tostop drinking if you can't control yourself. Ten days and costs.Next case."Jurgis gave vent to a cry of dismay, cut off suddenly by thepoliceman, who seized him by the collar. He was jerked out ofthe way, into a room with the convicted prisoners, where he satand wept like a child in his impotent rage. It seemed monstrousto him that policemen and judges should esteem his word asnothing in comparison with the bartender's--poor Jurgis could notknow that the owner of the saloon paid five dollars each week tothe policeman alone for Sunday privileges and general favors--nor that the pugilist bartender was one of the most trusted henchmenof the Democratic leader of the district, and had helped only afew months before to hustle out a record-breaking vote as atestimonial to the magistrate, who had been made the target ofodious kid-gloved reformers.Jurgis was driven out to the Bridewell for the second time. Inhis tumbling around he had hurt his arm again, and so could notwork, but had to be attended by the physician. Also his head andhis eye had to be tied up--and so he was a pretty-looking objectwhen, the second day after his arrival, he went out into theexercise court and encountered--Jack Duane!The young fellow was so glad to see Jurgis that he almost huggedhim. "By God, if it isn't 'the Stinker'!" he cried. "And whatis it--have you been through a sausage machine?""No," said Jurgis, "but I've been in a railroad wreck and afight." And then, while some of the other prisoners gatheredround he told his wild story; most of them were incredulous,but Duane knew that Jurgis could never have made up such a yarnas that."Hard luck, old man," he said, when they were alone; "but maybeit's taught you a lesson.""I've learned some things since I saw you last," said Jurgismournfully. Then he explained how he had spent the last summer,"hoboing it," as the phrase was. "And you?" he asked finally."Have you been here ever since?""Lord, no!" said the other. "I only came in the day beforeyesterday. It's the second time they've sent me up on atrumped-up charge--I've had hard luck and can't pay them whatthey want. Why don't you quit Chicago with me, Jurgis?""I've no place to go," said Jurgis, sadly."Neither have I," replied the other, laughing lightly. "Butwe'll wait till we get out and see."In the Bridewell Jurgis met few who had been there the last time,but he met scores of others, old and young, of exactly the samesort. It was like breakers upon a beach; there was new water,but the wave looked just the same. He strolled about and talkedwith them, and the biggest of them told tales of their prowess,while those who were weaker, or younger and inexperienced,gathered round and listened in admiring silence. The last timehe was there, Jurgis had thought of little but his family;but now he was free to listen to these men, and to realize that hewas one of them--that their point of view was his point of view,and that the way they kept themselves alive in the world was theway he meant to do it in the future.And so, when he was turned out of prison again, without a pennyin his pocket, he went straight to Jack Duane. He went full ofhumility and gratitude; for Duane was a gentleman, and a man witha profession--and it was remarkable that he should be willing tothrow in his lot with a humble workingman, one who had even beena beggar and a tramp. Jurgis could not see what help he could beto him; but he did not understand that a man like himself--whocould be trusted to stand by any one who was kind to him--was asrare among criminals as among any other class of men.The address Jurgis had was a garret room in the Ghetto district,the home of a pretty little French girl, Duane's mistress, whosewed all day, and eked out her living by prostitution. He hadgone elsewhere, she told Jurgis--he was afraid to stay there now,on account of the police. The new address was a cellar dive,whose proprietor said that he had never heard of Duane; but afterhe had put Jurgis through a catechism he showed him a back stairswhich led to a "fence" in the rear of a pawnbroker's shop, andthence to a number of assignation rooms, in one of which Duanewas hiding.Duane was glad to see him; he was without a cent of money,he said, and had been waiting for Jurgis to help him get some.He explained his plan--in fact he spent the day in laying bare tohis friend the criminal world of the city, and in showing him howhe might earn himself a living in it. That winter he would havea hard time, on account of his arm, and because of an unwontedfit of activity of the police; but so long as he was unknown tothem he would be safe if he were careful. Here at "Papa"Hanson's (so they called the old man who kept the dive) he mightrest at ease, for "Papa" Hanson was "square"--would stand by himso long as he paid, and gave him an hour's notice if there wereto be a police raid. Also Rosensteg, the pawnbroker, would buyanything he had for a third of its value, and guarantee to keepit hidden for a year.There was an oil stove in the little cupboard of a room, and theyhad some supper; and then about eleven o'clock at night theysallied forth together, by a rear entrance to the place, Duanearmed with a slingshot. They came to a residence district,and he sprang up a lamppost and blew out the light, and then the twododged into the shelter of an area step and hid in silence.Pretty soon a man came by, a workingman--and they let him go.Then after a long interval came the heavy tread of a policeman,and they held their breath till he was gone. Though half-frozen,they waited a full quarter of an hour after that--and then againcame footsteps, walking briskly. Duane nudged Jurgis, and theinstant the man had passed they rose up. Duane stole out assilently as a shadow, and a second later Jurgis heard a thud anda stifled cry. He was only a couple of feet behind, and heleaped to stop the man's mouth, while Duane held him fast by thearms, as they had agreed. But the man was limp and showed atendency to fall, and so Jurgis had only to hold him by thecollar, while the other, with swift fingers, went through hispockets--ripping open, first his overcoat, and then his coat,and then his vest, searching inside and outside, and transferring thecontents into his own pockets. At last, after feeling of theman's fingers and in his necktie, Duane whispered, "That's all!"and they dragged him to the area and dropped him in. Then Jurgiswent one way and his friend the other, walking briskly.The latter arrived first, and Jurgis found him examining the"swag." There was a gold watch, for one thing, with a chain andlocket; there was a silver pencil, and a matchbox, and a handfulof small change, and finally a cardcase. This last Duane openedfeverishly--there were letters and checks, and twotheater-tickets, and at last, in the back part, a wad of bills.He counted them--there was a twenty, five tens, four fives, andthree ones. Duane drew a long breath. "That lets us out!" hesaid.After further examination, they burned the cardcase and itscontents, all but the bills, and likewise the picture of a littlegirl in the locket. Then Duane took the watch and trinketsdownstairs, and came back with sixteen dollars. "The oldscoundrel said the case was filled," he said. "It's a lie, buthe knows I want the money."They divided up the spoils, and Jurgis got as his sharefifty-five dollars and some change. He protested that it was toomuch, but the other had agreed to divide even. That was a goodhaul, he said, better than average.When they got up in the morning, Jurgis was sent out to buy apaper; one of the pleasures of committing a crime was the readingabout it afterward. "I had a pal that always did it," Duaneremarked, laughing--"until one day he read that he had left threethousand dollars in a lower inside pocket of his party's vest!"There was a half-column account of the robbery--it was evidentthat a gang was operating in the neighborhood, said the paper,for it was the third within a week, and the police wereapparently powerless. The victim was an insurance agent, and hehad lost a hundred and ten dollars that did not belong to him.He had chanced to have his name marked on his shirt, otherwise hewould not have been identified yet. His assailant had hit himtoo hard, and he was suffering from concussion of the brain;and also he had been half-frozen when found, and would lose threefingers on his right hand. The enterprising newspaper reporterhad taken all this information to his family, and told how theyhad received it.Since it was Jurgis's first experience, these details naturallycaused him some worriment; but the other laughed coolly--it wasthe way of the game, and there was no helping it. Before longJurgis would think no more of it than they did in the yards ofknocking out a bullock. "It's a case of us or the other fellow,and I say the other fellow, every time," he observed."Still," said Jurgis, reflectively, "he never did us any harm.""He was doing it to somebody as hard as he could, you can be sureof that," said his friend.Duane had already explained to Jurgis that if a man of theirtrade were known he would have to work all the time to satisfythe demands of the police. Therefore it would be better forJurgis to stay in hiding and never be seen in public with hispal. But Jurgis soon got very tired of staying in hiding. In acouple of weeks he was feeling strong and beginning to use hisarm, and then he could not stand it any longer. Duane, who haddone a job of some sort by himself, and made a truce with thepowers, brought over Marie, his little French girl, to share withhim; but even that did not avail for long, and in the end he hadto give up arguing, and take Jurgis out and introduce him to thesaloons and "sporting houses" where the big crooks and "holdupmen" hung out.And so Jurgis got a glimpse of the high-class criminal world ofChicago. The city, which was owned by an oligarchy ofbusinessmen, being nominally ruled by the people, a huge army ofgraft was necessary for the purpose of effecting the transfer ofpower. Twice a year, in the spring and fall elections, millionsof dollars were furnished by the businessmen and expended by thisarmy; meetings were held and clever speakers were hired, bandsplayed and rockets sizzled, tons of documents and reservoirs ofdrinks were distributed, and tens of thousands of votes werebought for cash. And this army of graft had, of course, to bemaintained the year round. The leaders and organizers weremaintained by the businessmen directly--aldermen and legislatorsby means of bribes, party officials out of the campaign funds,lobbyists and corporation lawyers in the form of salaries,contractors by means of jobs, labor union leaders by subsidies,and newspaper proprietors and editors by advertisements. Therank and file, however, were either foisted upon the city, orelse lived off the population directly. There was the policedepartment, and the fire and water departments, and the wholebalance of the civil list, from the meanest office boy to thehead of a city department; and for the horde who could find noroom in these, there was the world of vice and crime, there waslicense to seduce, to swindle and plunder and prey. The lawforbade Sunday drinking; and this had delivered the saloon-keepers into the hands of the police, and made an alliancebetween them necessary. The law forbade prostitution; and thishad brought the "madames" into the combination. It was the samewith the gambling-house keeper and the poolroom man, and the samewith any other man or woman who had a means of getting "graft,"and was willing to pay over a share of it: the green-goods manand the highwayman, the pickpocket and the sneak thief, and thereceiver of stolen goods, the seller of adulterated milk, ofstale fruit and diseased meat, the proprietor of unsanitarytenements, the fake doctor and the usurer, the beggar and the"pushcart man," the prize fighter and the professional slugger,the race-track "tout," the procurer, the white-slave agent, andthe expert seducer of young girls. All of these agencies ofcorruption were banded together, and leagued in blood brotherhoodwith the politician and the police; more often than not they wereone and the same person,--the police captain would own thebrothel he pretended to raid, the politician would open hisheadquarters in his saloon. "Hinkydink" or "Bathhouse John,"or others of that ilk, were proprietors of the most notorious divesin Chicago, and also the "gray wolves" of the city council,who gave away the streets of the city to the businessmen; and thosewho patronized their places were the gamblers and prize fighterswho set the law at defiance, and the burglars and holdup men whokept the whole city in terror. On election day all these powersof vice and crime were one power; they could tell within one percent what the vote of their district would be, and they couldchange it at an hour's notice.A month ago Jurgis had all but perished of starvation upon thestreets; and now suddenly, as by the gift of a magic key, he hadentered into a world where money and all the good things of lifecame freely. He was introduced by his friend to an Irishmannamed "Buck" Halloran, who was a political "worker" and on theinside of things. This man talked with Jurgis for a while, andthen told him that he had a little plan by which a man who lookedlike a workingman might make some easy money; but it was aprivate affair, and had to be kept quiet. Jurgis expressedhimself as agreeable, and the other took him that afternoon(it was Saturday) to a place where city laborers were being paid off.The paymaster sat in a little booth, with a pile of envelopesbefore him, and two policemen standing by. Jurgis went,according to directions, and gave the name of "MichaelO'Flaherty," and received an envelope, which he took around thecorner and delivered to Halloran, who was waiting for him in asaloon. Then he went again; and gave the name of "JohannSchmidt," and a third time, and give the name of "SergeReminitsky." Halloran had quite a list of imaginary workingmen,and Jurgis got an envelope for each one. For this work hereceived five dollars, and was told that he might have it everyweek, so long as he kept quiet. As Jurgis was excellent atkeeping quiet, he soon won the trust of "Buck" Halloran, and wasintroduced to others as a man who could be depended upon.This acquaintance was useful to him in another way, also beforelong Jurgis made his discovery of the meaning of "pull," and justwhy his boss, Connor, and also the pugilist bartender, had beenable to send him to jail. One night there was given a ball, the"benefit" of "One-eyed Larry," a lame man who played the violinin one of the big "high-class" houses of prostitution on ClarkStreet, and was a wag and a popular character on the "Levee."This ball was held in a big dance hall, and was one of theoccasions when the city's powers of debauchery gave themselves upto madness. Jurgis attended and got half insane with drink,and began quarreling over a girl; his arm was pretty strong by then,and he set to work to clean out the place, and ended in a cell inthe police station. The police station being crowded to thedoors, and stinking with "bums," Jurgis did not relish stayingthere to sleep off his liquor, and sent for Halloran, who calledup the district leader and had Jurgis bailed out by telephone atfour o'clock in the morning. When he was arraigned that samemorning, the district leader had already seen the clerk of thecourt and explained that Jurgis Rudkus was a decent fellow, whohad been indiscreet; and so Jurgis was fined ten dollars and thefine was "suspended"--which meant that he did not have to pay forit, and never would have to pay it, unless somebody chose tobring it up against him in the future.Among the people Jurgis lived with now money was valued accordingto an entirely different standard from that of the people ofPackingtown; yet, strange as it may seem, he did a great dealless drinking than he had as a workingman. He had not the sameprovocations of exhaustion and hopelessness; he had now somethingto work for, to struggle for. He soon found that if he kept hiswits about him, he would come upon new opportunities; and beingnaturally an active man, he not only kept sober himself, buthelped to steady his friend, who was a good deal fonder of bothwine and women than he.One thing led to another. In the saloon where Jurgis met "Buck"Halloran he was sitting late one night with Duane, when a"country customer" (a buyer for an out-of-town merchant) came in,a little more than half "piped." There was no one else in theplace but the bartender, and as the man went out again Jurgis andDuane followed him; he went round the corner, and in a dark placemade by a combination of the elevated railroad and an unrentedbuilding, Jurgis leaped forward and shoved a revolver under hisnose, while Duane, with his hat pulled over his eyes, wentthrough the man's pockets with lightning fingers. They got hiswatch and his "wad," and were round the corner again and into thesaloon before he could shout more than once. The bartender, towhom they had tipped the wink, had the cellar door open for them,and they vanished, making their way by a secret entrance to abrothel next door. From the roof of this there was access tothree similar places beyond. By means of these passages thecustomers of any one place could be gotten out of the way, incase a falling out with the police chanced to lead to a raid;and also it was necessary to have a way of getting a girl out ofreach in case of an emergency. Thousands of them came to Chicagoanswering advertisements for "servants" and "factory hands," andfound themselves trapped by fake employment agencies, and lockedup in a bawdyhouse. It was generally enough to take all theirclothes away from them; but sometimes they would have to be"doped" and kept prisoners for weeks; and meantime their parentsmight be telegraphing the police, and even coming on to see whynothing was done. Occasionally there was no way of satisfyingthem but to let them search the place to which the girl had beentraced.For his help in this little job, the bartender received twentyout of the hundred and thirty odd dollars that the pair secured;and naturally this put them on friendly terms with him, and a fewdays later he introduced them to a little "sheeny" namedGoldberger, one of the "runners" of the "sporting house" wherethey had been hidden. After a few drinks Goldberger began, withsome hesitation, to narrate how he had had a quarrel over hisbest girl with a professional "cardsharp," who had hit him in thejaw. The fellow was a stranger in Chicago, and if he was foundsome night with his head cracked there would be no one to carevery much. Jurgis, who by this time would cheerfully havecracked the heads of all the gamblers in Chicago, inquired whatwould be coming to him; at which the Jew became still moreconfidential, and said that he had some tips on the New Orleansraces, which he got direct from the police captain of thedistrict, whom he had got out of a bad scrape, and who "stood in"with a big syndicate of horse owners. Duane took all this in atonce, but Jurgis had to have the whole race-track situationexplained to him before he realized the importance of such anopportunity.There was the gigantic Racing Trust. It owned the legislaturesin every state in which it did business; it even owned some ofthe big newspapers, and made public opinion--there was no powerin the land that could oppose it unless, perhaps, it were thePoolroom Trust. It built magnificent racing parks all over thecountry, and by means of enormous purses it lured the people tocome, and then it organized a gigantic shell game, whereby itplundered them of hundreds of millions of dollars every year.Horse racing had once been a sport, but nowadays it was abusiness; a horse could be "doped" and doctored, undertrained orovertrained; it could be made to fall at any moment--or its gaitcould be broken by lashing it with the whip, which all thespectators would take to be a desperate effort to keep it in thelead. There were scores of such tricks; and sometimes it was theowners who played them and made fortunes, sometimes it was thejockeys and trainers, sometimes it was outsiders, who bribedthem--but most of the time it was the chiefs of the trust. Nowfor instance, they were having winter racing in New Orleans and asyndicate was laying out each day's program in advance, and itsagents in all the Northern cities were "milking" the poolrooms.The word came by long-distance telephone in a cipher code, just alittle while before each race; and any man who could get thesecret had as good as a fortune. If Jurgis did not believe it,he could try it, said the little Jew--let them meet at a certainhouse on the morrow and make a test. Jurgis was willing, and sowas Duane, and so they went to one of the high-class poolroomswhere brokers and merchants gambled (with society women in aprivate room), and they put up ten dollars each upon a horsecalled "Black Beldame," a six to one shot, and won. For a secretlike that they would have done a good many sluggings--but thenext day Goldberger informed them that the offending gambler hadgot wind of what was coming to him, and had skipped the town.There were ups and downs at the business; but there was always aliving, inside of a jail, if not out of it. Early in April thecity elections were due, and that meant prosperity for all thepowers of graft. Jurgis, hanging round in dives and gamblinghouses and brothels, met with the heelers of both parties,and from their conversation he came to understand all the ins andouts of the game, and to hear of a number of ways in which hecould make himself useful about election time. "Buck" Halloranwas a "Democrat," and so Jurgis became a Democrat also; but hewas not a bitter one--the Republicans were good fellows, too,and were to have a pile of money in this next campaign. At the lastelection the Republicans had paid four dollars a vote to theDemocrats' three; and "Buck" Halloran sat one night playing cardswith Jurgis and another man, who told how Halloran had beencharged with the job voting a "bunch" of thirty-seven newlylanded Italians, and how he, the narrator, had met the Republicanworker who was after the very same gang, and how the three hadeffected a bargain, whereby the Italians were to vote half andhalf, for a glass of beer apiece, while the balance of the fundwent to the conspirators!Not long after this, Jurgis, wearying of the risks andvicissitudes of miscellaneous crime, was moved to give up thecareer for that of a politician. Just at this time there was atremendous uproar being raised concerning the alliance betweenthe criminals and the police. For the criminal graft was one inwhich the businessmen had no direct part--it was what is called a"side line," carried by the police. "Wide open" gambling anddebauchery made the city pleasing to "trade," but burglaries andholdups did not. One night it chanced that while Jack Duane wasdrilling a safe in a clothing store he was caught red-handed bythe night watchman, and turned over to a policeman, who chancedto know him well, and who took the responsibility of letting himmake his escape. Such a howl from the newspapers followed thisthat Duane was slated for sacrifice, and barely got out of townin time. And just at that juncture it happened that Jurgis wasintroduced to a man named Harper whom he recognized as the nightwatchman at Brown's, who had been instrumental in making him anAmerican citizen, the first year of his arrival at the yards.The other was interested in the coincidence, but did not rememberJurgis--he had handled too many "green ones" in his time, hesaid. He sat in a dance hall with Jurgis and Halloran until oneor two in the morning, exchanging experiences. He had a longstory to tell of his quarrel with the superintendent of hisdepartment, and how he was now a plain workingman, and a goodunion man as well. It was not until some months afterward thatJurgis understood that the quarrel with the superintendent hadbeen prearranged, and that Harper was in reality drawing a salaryof twenty dollars a week from the packers for an inside report ofhis union's secret proceedings. The yards were seething withagitation just then, said the man, speaking as a unionist. Thepeople of Packingtown had borne about all that they would bear,and it looked as if a strike might begin any week.After this talk the man made inquiries concerning Jurgis, and acouple of days later he came to him with an interestingproposition. He was not absolutely certain, he said, but hethought that he could get him a regular salary if he would cometo Packingtown and do as he was told, and keep his mouth shut.Harper--"Bush" Harper, he was called--was a right-hand man ofMike Scully, the Democratic boss of the stockyards; and in thecoming election there was a peculiar situation. There had cometo Scully a proposition to nominate a certain rich brewer wholived upon a swell boulevard that skirted the district, and whocoveted the big badge and the "honorable" of an alderman. Thebrewer was a Jew, and had no brains, but he was harmless, andwould put up a rare campaign fund. Scully had accepted theoffer, and then gone to the Republicans with a proposition. Hewas not sure that he could manage the "sheeny," and he did notmean to take any chances with his district; let the Republicansnominate a certain obscure but amiable friend of Scully's, whowas now setting tenpins in the cellar of an Ashland Avenuesaloon, and he, Scully, would elect him with the "sheeny's"money, and the Republicans might have the glory, which was morethan they would get otherwise. In return for this theRepublicans would agree to put up no candidate the followingyear, when Scully himself came up for reelection as the otheralderman from the ward. To this the Republicans had assentedat once; but the hell of it was--so Harper explained--that theRepublicans were all of them fools--a man had to be a fool to bea Republican in the stockyards, where Scully was king. And theydidn't know how to work, and of course it would not do for theDemocratic workers, the noble redskins of the War Whoop League,to support the Republican openly. The difficulty would not havebeen so great except for another fact--there had been a curiousdevelopment in stockyards politics in the last year or two, a newparty having leaped into being. They were the Socialists; and itwas a devil of a mess, said "Bush" Harper. The one image whichthe word "Socialist" brought to Jurgis was of poor littleTamoszius Kuszleika, who had called himself one, and would go outwith a couple of other men and a soap-box, and shout himselfhoarse on a street corner Saturday nights. Tamoszius had triedto explain to Jurgis what it was all about, but Jurgis, who wasnot of an imaginative turn, had never quire got it straight; atpresent he was content with his companion's explanation that theSocialists were the enemies of American institutions--could notbe bought, and would not combine or make any sort of a "dicker."Mike Scully was very much worried over the opportunity which hislast deal gave to them--the stockyards Democrats were furious atthe idea of a rich capitalist for their candidate, and while theywere changing they might possibly conclude that a Socialistfirebrand was preferable to a Republican bum. And so right herewas a chance for Jurgis to make himself a place in the world,explained "Bush" Harper; he had been a union man, and he wasknown in the yards as a workingman; he must have hundreds ofacquaintances, and as he had never talked politics with them hemight come out as a Republican now without exciting the leastsuspicion. There were barrels of money for the use of those whocould deliver the goods; and Jurgis might count upon Mike Scully,who had never yet gone back on a friend. Just what could he do?Jurgis asked, in some perplexity, and the other explained indetail. To begin with, he would have to go to the yards andwork, and he mightn't relish that; but he would have what heearned, as well as the rest that came to him. He would getactive in the union again, and perhaps try to get an office, ashe, Harper, had; he would tell all his friends the good points ofDoyle, the Republican nominee, and the bad ones of the "sheeny";and then Scully would furnish a meeting place, and he would startthe "Young Men's Republican Association," or something of thatsort, and have the rich brewer's best beer by the hogshead, andfireworks and speeches, just like the War Whoop League. SurelyJurgis must know hundreds of men who would like that sort of fun;and there would be the regular Republican leaders and workers tohelp him out, and they would deliver a big enough majority onelection day.When he had heard all this explanation to the end, Jurgisdemanded: "But how can I get a job in Packingtown? I'mblacklisted."At which "Bush" Harper laughed. "I'll attend to that all right,"he said.And the other replied, "It's a go, then; I'm your man." So Jurgiswent out to the stockyards again, and was introduced to thepolitical lord of the district, the boss of Chicago's mayor. Itwas Scully who owned the brickyards and the dump and the icepond--though Jurgis did not know it. It was Scully who was toblame for the unpaved street in which Jurgis's child had beendrowned; it was Scully who had put into office the magistrate whohad first sent Jurgis to jail; it was Scully who was principalstockholder in the company which had sold him the ramshackletenement, and then robbed him of it. But Jurgis knew none ofthese things--any more than he knew that Scully was but a tooland puppet of the packers. To him Scully was a mighty power, the"biggest" man he had ever met.He was a little, dried-up Irishman, whose hands shook. He had abrief talk with his visitor, watching him with his ratlike eyes,and making up his mind about him; and then he gave him a note toMr. Harmon, one of the head managers of Durham's--"The bearer, Jurgis Rudkus, is a particular friend of mine, and Iwould like you to find him a good place, for important reasons.He was once indiscreet, but you will perhaps be so good as tooverlook that."Mr. Harmon looked up inquiringly when he read this. "What doeshe mean by 'indiscreet'?" he asked."I was blacklisted, sir," said Jurgis.At which the other frowned. "Blacklisted?" he said. "How do youmean?" And Jurgis turned red with embarrassment.He had forgotten that a blacklist did not exist. "I--that is--Ihad difficulty in getting a place," he stammered."What was the matter?""I got into a quarrel with a foreman--not my own boss, sir--andstruck him.""I see," said the other, and meditated for a few moments. "Whatdo you wish to do?" he asked."Anything, sir," said Jurgis--"only I had a broken arm thiswinter, and so I have to be careful.""How would it suit you to be a night watchman?""That wouldn't do, sir. I have to be among the men at night.""I see--politics. Well, would it suit you to trim hogs?""Yes, sir," said Jurgis.And Mr. Harmon called a timekeeper and said, "Take this man toPat Murphy and tell him to find room for him somehow."And so Jurgis marched into the hog-killing room, a place where,in the days gone by, he had come begging for a job. Now hewalked jauntily, and smiled to himself, seeing the frown thatcame to the boss's face as the timekeeper said, "Mr. Harmon saysto put this man on." It would overcrowd his department and spoilthe record he was trying to make--but he said not a word except"All right."And so Jurgis became a workingman once more; and straightway hesought out his old friends, and joined the union, and began to"root" for "Scotty" Doyle. Doyle had done him a good turn once,he explained, and was really a bully chap; Doyle was a workingmanhimself, and would represent the workingmen--why did they want tovote for a millionaire "sheeny," and what the hell had MikeScully ever done for them that they should back his candidatesall the time? And meantime Scully had given Jurgis a note to theRepublican leader of the ward, and he had gone there and met thecrowd he was to work with. Already they had hired a big hall,with some of the brewer's money, and every night Jurgis broughtin a dozen new members of the "Doyle Republican Association."Pretty soon they had a grand opening night; and there was a brassband, which marched through the streets, and fireworks and bombsand red lights in front of the hall; and there was an enormouscrowd, with two overflow meetings--so that the pale and tremblingcandidate had to recite three times over the little speech whichone of Scully's henchmen had written, and which he had been amonth learning by heart. Best of all, the famous and eloquentSenator Spareshanks, presidential candidate, rode out in anautomobile to discuss the sacred privileges of Americancitizenship, and protection and prosperity for the Americanworkingman. His inspiriting address was quoted to the extent ofhalf a column in all the morning newspapers, which also said thatit could be stated upon excellent authority that the unexpectedpopularity developed by Doyle, the Republican candidate foralderman, was giving great anxiety to Mr. Scully, the chairman ofthe Democratic City Committee.The chairman was still more worried when the monster torchlightprocession came off, with the members of the Doyle RepublicanAssociation all in red capes and hats, and free beer for everyvoter in the ward--the best beer ever given away in a politicalcampaign, as the whole electorate testified. During this parade,and at innumerable cart-tail meetings as well, Jurgis laboredtirelessly. He did not make any speeches--there were lawyers andother experts for that--but he helped to manage things;distributing notices and posting placards and bringing out thecrowds; and when the show was on he attended to the fireworks andthe beer. Thus in the course of the campaign he handled manyhundreds of dollars of the Hebrew brewer's money, administeringit with naive and touching fidelity. Toward the end, however,he learned that he was regarded with hatred by the rest of the"boys," because he compelled them either to make a poorer showingthan he or to do without their share of the pie. After thatJurgis did his best to please them, and to make up for the timehe had lost before he discovered the extra bungholes of thecampaign barrel.He pleased Mike Scully, also. On election morning he was out atfour o'clock, "getting out the vote"; he had a two-horse carriageto ride in, and he went from house to house for his friends, andescorted them in triumph to the polls. He voted half a dozentimes himself, and voted some of his friends as often; he broughtbunch after bunch of the newest foreigners--Lithuanians, Poles,Bohemians, Slovaks--and when he had put them through the mill heturned them over to another man to take to the next pollingplace. When Jurgis first set out, the captain of the precinctgave him a hundred dollars, and three times in the course of theday he came for another hundred, and not more than twenty-fiveout of each lot got stuck in his own pocket. The balance allwent for actual votes, and on a day of Democratic landslides theyelected "Scotty" Doyle, the ex-tenpin setter, by nearly athousand plurality--and beginning at five o'clock in theafternoon, and ending at three the next morning, Jurgis treatedhimself to a most unholy and horrible "jag." Nearly every oneelse in Packingtown did the same, however, for there wasuniversal exultation over this triumph of popular government,this crushing defeat of an arrogant plutocrat by the power of thecommon people.