Chapter 6

by Upton Sinclair

　　Jurgis and Ona were very much in love; they had waited a long time--it was now well into the second year, and Jurgis judged everything bythe criterion of its helping or hindering their union. All his thoughtswere there; he accepted the family because it was a part of Ona. And hewas interested in the house because it was to be Ona's home. Even thetricks and cruelties he saw at Durham's had little meaning for him justthen, save as they might happen to affect his future with Ona.The marriage would have been at once, if they had had their way;but this would mean that they would have to do without any weddingfeast, and when they suggested this they came into conflict with theold people. To Teta Elzbieta especially the very suggestion was anaffliction. What! she would cry. To be married on the roadside likea parcel of beggars! No! No!--Elzbieta had some traditions behind her;she had been a person of importance in her girlhood--had lived on a bigestate and had servants, and might have married well and been a lady,but for the fact that there had been nine daughters and no sons in thefamily. Even so, however, she knew what was decent, and clung to hertraditions with desperation. They were not going to lose all caste,even if they had come to be unskilled laborers in Packingtown; and thatOna had even talked of omitting a Yeselija was enough to keep herstepmother lying awake all night. It was in vain for them to say thatthey had so few friends; they were bound to have friends in time, and thenthe friends would talk about it. They must not give up what was rightfor a little money--if they did, the money would never do them any good,they could depend upon that. And Elzbieta would call upon Dede Antanasto support her; there was a fear in the souls of these two, lest thisjourney to a new country might somehow undermine the old home virtues oftheir children. The very first Sunday they had all been taken to mass;and poor as they were, Elzbieta had felt it advisable to invest a littleof her resources in a representation of the babe of Bethlehem, made inplaster, and painted in brilliant colors. Though it was only a foot high,there was a shrine with four snow-white steeples, and the Virgin standingwith her child in her arms, and the kings and shepherds and wise menbowing down before him. It had cost fifty cents; but Elzbieta had afeeling that money spent for such things was not to be counted tooclosely, it would come back in hidden ways. The piece was beautifulon the parlor mantel, and one could not have a home without some sortof ornament.The cost of the wedding feast would, of course, be returned to them;but the problem was to raise it even temporarily. They had been inthe neighborhood so short a time that they could not get much credit,and there was no one except Szedvilas from whom they could borrow evena little. Evening after evening Jurgis and Ona would sit and figure theexpenses, calculating the term of their separation. They could notpossibly manage it decently for less than two hundred dollars, and eventhough they were welcome to count in the whole of the earnings of Marijaand Jonas, as a loan, they could not hope to raise this sum in less thanfour or five months. So Ona began thinking of seeking employment herself,saying that if she had even ordinarily good luck, she might be able totake two months off the time. They were just beginning to adjustthemselves to this necessity, when out of the clear sky there fell athunderbolt upon them--a calamity that scattered all their hopes to thefour winds.About a block away from them there lived another Lithuanian family,consisting of an elderly widow and one grown son; their name wasMajauszkis, and our friends struck up an acquaintance with them beforelong. One evening they came over for a visit, and naturally the firstsubject upon which the conversation turned was the neighborhood and itshistory; and then Grandmother Majauszkiene, as the old lady was called,proceeded to recite to them a string of horrors that fairly froze theirblood. She was a wrinkled-up and wizened personage--she must have beeneighty--and as she mumbled the grim story through her toothless gums,she seemed a very old witch to them. Grandmother Majauszkiene had livedin the midst of misfortune so long that it had come to be her element,and she talked about starvation, sickness, and death as other peoplemight about weddings and holidays.The thing came gradually. In the first place as to the house they hadbought, it was not new at all, as they had supposed; it was about fifteenyears old, and there was nothing new upon it but the paint, which was sobad that it needed to be put on new every year or two. The house was oneof a whole row that was built by a company which existed to make moneyby swindling poor people. The family had paid fifteen hundred dollarsfor it, and it had not cost the builders five hundred, when it was new.Grandmother Majauszkiene knew that because her son belonged to a politicalorganization with a contractor who put up exactly such houses. They usedthe very flimsiest and cheapest material; they built the houses a dozenat a time, and they cared about nothing at all except the outside shine.The family could take her word as to the trouble they would have, for shehad been through it all--she and her son had bought their house in exactlythe same way. They had fooled the company, however, for her son was askilled man, who made as high as a hundred dollars a month, and as he hadhad sense enough not to marry, they had been able to pay for the house.Grandmother Majauszkiene saw that her friends were puzzled at this remark;they did not quite see how paying for the house was "fooling the company."Evidently they were very inexperienced. Cheap as the houses were, theywere sold with the idea that the people who bought them would not be ableto pay for them. When they failed--if it were only by a single month--they would lose the house and all that they had paid on it, and thenthe company would sell it over again. And did they often get a chanceto do that? Dieve! (Grandmother Majauszkiene raised her hands.) They didit--how often no one could say, but certainly more than half of the time.They might ask any one who knew anything at all about Packingtown as tothat; she had been living here ever since this house was built, and shecould tell them all about it. And had it ever been sold before?Susimilkie! Why, since it had been built, no less than four familiesthat their informant could name had tried to buy it and failed. She wouldtell them a little about it.The first family had been Germans. The families had all been of differentnationalities--there had been a representative of several races that haddisplaced each other in the stockyards. Grandmother Majauszkiene hadcome to America with her son at a time when so far as she knew there wasonly one other Lithuanian family in the district; the workers had allbeen Germans then--skilled cattle butchers that the packers had broughtfrom abroad to start the business. Afterward, as cheaper labor had come,these Germans had moved away. The next were the Irish--there had beensix or eight years when Packingtown had been a regular Irish city.There were a few colonies of them still here, enough to run all theunions and the police force and get all the graft; but most of thosewho were working in the packing houses had gone away at the next dropin wages--after the big strike. The Bohemians had come then, and afterthem the Poles. People said that old man Durham himself was responsiblefor these immigrations; he had sworn that he would fix the people ofPackingtown so that they would never again call a strike on him, and sohe had sent his agents into every city and village in Europe to spreadthe tale of the chances of work and high wages at the stockyards.The people had come in hordes; and old Durham had squeezed them tighterand tighter, speeding them up and grinding them to pieces and sendingfor new ones. The Poles, who had come by tens of thousands, had beendriven to the wall by the Lithuanians, and now the Lithuanians weregiving way to the Slovaks. Who there was poorer and more miserable thanthe Slovaks, Grandmother Majauszkiene had no idea, but the packers wouldfind them, never fear. It was easy to bring them, for wages were reallymuch higher, and it was only when it was too late that the poor peoplefound out that everything else was higher too. They were like rats ina trap, that was the truth; and more of them were piling in every day.By and by they would have their revenge, though, for the thing wasgetting beyond human endurance, and the people would rise and murderthe packers. Grandmother Majauszkiene was a socialist, or some suchstrange thing; another son of hers was working in the mines of Siberia,and the old lady herself had made speeches in her time--which made herseem all the more terrible to her present auditors.They called her back to the story of the house. The German familyhad been a good sort. To be sure there had been a great many of them,which was a common failing in Packingtown; but they had worked hard,and the father had been a steady man, and they had a good deal morethan half paid for the house. But he had been killed in an elevatoraccident in Durham's.Then there had come the Irish, and there had been lots of them, too;the husband drank and beat the children--the neighbors could hear themshrieking any night. They were behind with their rent all the time,but the company was good to them; there was some politics back of that,Grandmother Majauszkiene could not say just what, but the Laffertyshad belonged to the "War Whoop League," which was a sort of politicalclub of all the thugs and rowdies in the district; and if you belongedto that, you could never be arrested for anything. Once upon a timeold Lafferty had been caught with a gang that had stolen cows fromseveral of the poor people of the neighborhood and butchered them inan old shanty back of the yards and sold them. He had been in jail onlythree days for it, and had come out laughing, and had not even lost hisplace in the packing house. He had gone all to ruin with the drink,however, and lost his power; one of his sons, who was a good man,had kept him and the family up for a year or two, but then he had gotsick with consumption.That was another thing, Grandmother Majauszkiene interrupted herself--this house was unlucky. Every family that lived in it, some one wassure to get consumption. Nobody could tell why that was; there mustbe something about the house, or the way it was built--some folks saidit was because the building had been begun in the dark of the moon.There were dozens of houses that way in Packingtown. Sometimes therewould be a particular room that you could point out--if anybody sleptin that room he was just as good as dead. With this house it had beenthe Irish first; and then a Bohemian family had lost a child of it--though, to be sure, that was uncertain, since it was hard to tell whatwas the matter with children who worked in the yards. In those daysthere had been no law about the age of children--the packers had workedall but the babies. At this remark the family looked puzzled, andGrandmother Majauszkiene again had to make an explanation--that it wasagainst the law for children to work before they were sixteen. What wasthe sense of that? they asked. They had been thinking of letting littleStanislovas go to work. Well, there was no need to worry, GrandmotherMajauszkiene said--the law made no difference except that it forcedpeople to lie about the ages of their children. One would like to knowwhat the lawmakers expected them to do; there were families that had nopossible means of support except the children, and the law provided themno other way of getting a living. Very often a man could get no work inPackingtown for months, while a child could go and get a place easily;there was always some new machine, by which the packers could get asmuch work out of a child as they had been able to get out of a man,and for a third of the pay.To come back to the house again, it was the woman of the next familythat had died. That was after they had been there nearly four years,and this woman had had twins regularly every year--and there had beenmore than you could count when they moved in. After she died the manwould go to work all day and leave them to shift for themselves--theneighbors would help them now and then, for they would almost freezeto death. At the end there were three days that they were alone,before it was found out that the father was dead. He was a "floorsman"at Jones's, and a wounded steer had broken loose and mashed him againsta pillar. Then the children had been taken away, and the company hadsold the house that very same week to a party of emigrants.So this grim old women went on with her tale of horrors. How muchof it was exaggeration--who could tell? It was only too plausible.There was that about consumption, for instance. They knew nothing aboutconsumption whatever, except that it made people cough; and for two weeksthey had been worrying about a coughing-spell of Antanas. It seemed toshake him all over, and it never stopped; you could see a red stainwherever he had spit upon the floor.And yet all these things were as nothing to what came a little later.They had begun to question the old lady as to why one family had beenunable to pay, trying to show her by figures that it ought to have beenpossible; and Grandmother Majauszkiene had disputed their figures--"You say twelve dollars a month; but that does not include the interest." Then they stared at her. "Interest!" they cried."Interest on the money you still owe," she answered."But we don't have to pay any interest!" they exclaimed, three or fourat once. "We only have to pay twelve dollars each month."And for this she laughed at them. "You are like all the rest," she said;"they trick you and eat you alive. They never sell the houses withoutinterest. Get your deed, and see."Then, with a horrible sinking of the heart, Teta Elzbieta unlocked herbureau and brought out the paper that had already caused them so manyagonies. Now they sat round, scarcely breathing, while the old lady,who could read English, ran over it. "Yes," she said, finally, "here itis, of course: 'With interest thereon monthly, at the rate of seven percent per annum.'"And there followed a dead silence. "What does that mean?" asked Jurgisfinally, almost in a whisper."That means," replied the other, "that you have to pay them seven dollarsnext month, as well as the twelve dollars."Then again there was not a sound. It was sickening, like a nightmare,in which suddenly something gives way beneath you, and you feel yourselfsinking, sinking, down into bottomless abysses. As if in a flash oflightning they saw themselves--victims of a relentless fate, cornered,trapped, in the grip of destruction. All the fair structure of theirhopes came crashing about their ears.--And all the time the old womanwas going on talking. They wished that she would be still; her voicesounded like the croaking of some dismal raven. Jurgis sat with hishands clenched and beads of perspiration on his forehead, and there wasa great lump in Ona's throat, choking her. Then suddenly Teta Elzbietabroke the silence with a wail, and Marija began to wring her hands andsob, "Ai! Ai! Beda man!"All their outcry did them no good, of course. There sat GrandmotherMajauszkiene, unrelenting, typifying fate. No, of course it was not fair,but then fairness had nothing to do with it. And of course they had notknown it. They had not been intended to know it. But it was in the deed,and that was all that was necessary, as they would find when the time came.Somehow or other they got rid of their guest, and then they passed anight of lamentation. The children woke up and found out that somethingwas wrong, and they wailed and would not be comforted. In the morning,of course, most of them had to go to work, the packing houses would notstop for their sorrows; but by seven o'clock Ona and her stepmother werestanding at the door of the office of the agent. Yes, he told them,when he came, it was quite true that they would have to pay interest.And then Teta Elzbieta broke forth into protestations and reproaches,so that the people outside stopped and peered in at the window. The agentwas as bland as ever. He was deeply pained, he said. He had not toldthem, simply because he had supposed they would understand that they hadto pay interest upon their debt, as a matter of course.So they came away, and Ona went down to the yards, and at noontime sawJurgis and told him. Jurgis took it stolidly--he had made up his mindto it by this time. It was part of fate; they would manage it somehow--he made his usual answer, "I will work harder." It would upset theirplans for a time; and it would perhaps be necessary for Ona to get workafter all. Then Ona added that Teta Elzbieta had decided that littleStanislovas would have to work too. It was not fair to let Jurgis andher support the family--the family would have to help as it could.Previously Jurgis had scouted this idea, but now knit his brows andnodded his head slowly--yes, perhaps it would be best; they would allhave to make some sacrifices now.So Ona set out that day to hunt for work; and at night Marija came homesaying that she had met a girl named Jasaityte who had a friend thatworked in one of the wrapping rooms in Brown's, and might get a placefor Ona there; only the forelady was the kind that takes presents--itwas no use for any one to ask her for a place unless at the same timethey slipped a ten-dollar bill into her hand. Jurgis was not in theleast surprised at this now--he merely asked what the wages of the placewould be. So negotiations were opened, and after an interview Ona camehome and reported that the forelady seemed to like her, and had said that,while she was not sure, she thought she might be able to put her at worksewing covers on hams, a job at which she would earn as much as eight orten dollars a week. That was a bid, so Marija reported, after consultingher friend; and then there was an anxious conference at home. The workwas done in one of the cellars, and Jurgis did not want Ona to work insuch a place; but then it was easy work, and one could not have everything.So in the end Ona, with a ten-dollar bill burning a hole in her palm, hadanother interview with the forelady.Meantime Teta Elzbieta had taken Stanislovas to the priest and gottena certificate to the effect that he was two years older than he was;and with it the little boy now sallied forth to make his fortune inthe world. It chanced that Durham had just put in a wonderful newlard machine, and when the special policeman in front of the timestation saw Stanislovas and his document, he smiled to himself andtold him to go--"Czia! Czia!" pointing. And so Stanislovas went downa long stone corridor, and up a flight of stairs, which took him intoa room lighted by electricity, with the new machines for filling lardcans at work in it. The lard was finished on the floor above, and itcame in little jets, like beautiful, wriggling, snow-white snakes ofunpleasant odor. There were several kinds and sizes of jets, and aftera certain precise quantity had come out, each stopped automatically,and the wonderful machine made a turn, and took the can under another jet,and so on, until it was filled neatly to the brim, and pressed tightly,and smoothed off. To attend to all this and fill several hundred cansof lard per hour, there were necessary two human creatures, one of whomknew how to place an empty lard can on a certain spot every few seconds,and the other of whom knew how to take a full lard can off a certain spotevery few seconds and set it upon a tray.And so, after little Stanislovas had stood gazing timidly about him fora few minutes, a man approached him, and asked what he wanted, to whichStanislovas said, "Job." Then the man said "How old?" and Stanislovasanswered, "Sixtin." Once or twice every year a state inspector wouldcome wandering through the packing plants, asking a child here andthere how old he was; and so the packers were very careful to complywith the law, which cost them as much trouble as was now involved inthe boss's taking the document from the little boy, and glancing at it,and then sending it to the office to be filed away. Then he set some oneelse at a different job, and showed the lad how to place a lard can everytime the empty arm of the remorseless machine came to him; and so wasdecided the place in the universe of little Stanislovas, and his destinytill the end of his days. Hour after hour, day after day, year afteryear, it was fated that he should stand upon a certain square foot offloor from seven in the morning until noon, and again from half-pasttwelve till half-past five, making never a motion and thinking never athought, save for the setting of lard cans. In summer the stench of thewarm lard would be nauseating, and in winter the cans would all but freezeto his naked little fingers in the unheated cellar. Half the year it wouldbe dark as night when he went in to work, and dark as night again when hecame out, and so he would never know what the sun looked like on weekdays.And for this, at the end of the week, he would carry home three dollars tohis family, being his pay at the rate of five cents per hour--just abouthis proper share of the total earnings of the million and three-quarters ofchildren who are now engaged in earning their livings in the United States.And meantime, because they were young, and hope is not to be stifled beforeits time, Jurgis and Ona were again calculating; for they had discoveredthat the wages of Stanislovas would a little more than pay the interest,which left them just about as they had been before! It would be but fairto them to say that the little boy was delighted with his work, and at theidea of earning a lot of money; and also that the two were very much inlove with each other.