Эптон Синклер - Oil!

Bunny carried this anguish back to his father. What were the people going to do, when they no longer had food to keep alive? Dad gave the answer, they’d have to go back to work! “And lose the strike, Dad?” Yes, he said, if they couldn’t win, they’d have to lose—that was the law of strikes, as of everything else. Life was stern, and sooner or later you had to learn it. They must give up, and wait till a time when their union was stronger. “But Dad, how can they make it stronger, when the operators boycott them? You know how they weed out the union men—right now, if they give up, most of the companies won’t take back the active ones.” And Dad said he knew that, but the men would have to keep on trying, there was no other way. Certainly he could not support the strike by keeping his wells idle! The men must understand that he couldn’t stand the gaff much longer, they had no right to expect it; they must either close the other wells, or see the Ross wells opened. And Bunny turned sort of sick inside, and went about hiding a thought like a dirty vice: “We’re going to bring scabs into our tract!”

There was really only one place where Bunny could be happy, and that was up at the bungalow. He spent his Saturday afternoon there, helping Ruth and Meelie—the one kind of aid he was permitted to give to the strike! Part of the time they talked about the suffering of which they knew; and part of the time they were jolly, making jokes like other young people; but all the time they worked like beavers, turning flour belonging to the union into various kinds of eatables. At supper-time Mr. Watkins came with the wagon, his second trip, and they loaded him up, and Meelie drove off with him to headquarters, while Bunny stayed with Ruth, and helped clean up the place, and tried to explain the predicament of his father, and why he, Bunny, could not really help the strike.

On Sunday he went in to the meetings, and heard Paul make another speech. Paul, always sombre looking, was now gaunt from several weeks of little food and less sleep, and there was a fury of passion in his voice; he told about his trip to the other fields, and how there was no justice anywhere—the authorities of town and county and state were simply pawns of the operators, doing everything possible to hold the men down and break their organization. In this white flame of suffering Paul’s spirit had been tempered to steel, and the crowd of workers shared this process, and took new vows of solidarity; Bunny felt the thrill of a great mass experience, and yearned to be part of it, and then shrunk back, like the young man in the Bible story who had too many possessions.

Paul had seen him in the crowd, and after the meeting sought him out. “I want to talk to you,” he said, and they strolled away from the others, and Paul, who had no time to waste, came directly to the point:

“See here, I want you to let my sister alone.”

“Let her alone!” cried the other, and stopped short in his tracks, and stared at Paul. “Why, what do you mean?”

“Meelie tells me you’ve been up there at the place a lot—you were there last evening with her.”

“But Paul! Somebody had to stay with her!”

“We’ll take care of ourselves; she could have come to father’s place. And I want you to understand, I won’t have any rich young fellows hanging round my sister.”

“But Paul!” Bunny’s tone was one of shocked grief. “Truly, Paul, you’re utterly mistaken.”

“I don’t want you to be mistaken about this one thing—if any fellow was to do any wrong to my sister, I’d kill him, just as sure as anything on earth.”

“But Paul, I never dreamed of such a thing! Why, listen—I’ll tell you—I’m in love with a girl—a girl in school. Oh, honest, Paul, I’m terribly in love, and I—I couldn’t think of anybody else that way.”

A quick blush had spread over Bunny’s face as he made this confession, and it was impossible not to realize that he was sincere. Paul’s voice became kinder. “Listen, son; you’re not a child any more, and neither is Ruth. I don’t doubt what you say—naturally, you’ll pick out some girl of your own class. But it mightn’t be that way with Ruth, she might get to be interested in you, and you ought to keep away.”

Bunny didn’t know what to say to that—the idea was too new to him. “I wanted to know about the strike,” he explained; “and I’ve had no chance to talk with you at all. You can’t imagine how bad I feel, but I don’t know what to do.” He rushed on, crowding all his grief into a few sentences; he was torn in half, between his loyalty to his father and his sympathy for the men; it was a trap he was in, and what could he do?

When Paul answered, his voice was hard again. “Your father is helping to keep these blackguards in the field, I understand.”

“He’s paying assessments, if that’s what you mean. He’s under contract with the Federation—when he joined—”

“No contract is valid that requires breaking the law! And don’t you know these fellows are breaking a hundred laws a day?”

“I know, Paul; but Dad is tied up with the other operators; you don’t understand—he’s really having trouble financially, because his wells are shut down; and he’s doing that entirely for the men.”

“I know it, and we appreciate it. But now he says he’s got to give up, and bring in scabs like the rest. They’re driving us beyond endurance; they’re making a dirty fight, and your father knows it—and yet he goes along with them!”

There was a pause, and Paul went on grimly. “I know, of course; his money is at stake, and he won’t risk it; and you’ll do what he tells you.”

“But Paul! I couldn’t oppose Dad! Would you expect that?”

“When my father set up his will, and tried to keep me from thinking and learning the truth, I opposed him, didn’t I? And you encouraged me to do it—you thought that was all right.”

“But Paul! If I were to oppose Dad in such a thing—why, I’d break his heart.”

“Well, maybe I broke my father’s heart—I don’t know, and neither do you. The point is, you father’s doing wrong, and you know it; he’s helping to turn these ruffians loose on us, and deprive us of our rights as citizens, and even as human beings. You can’t deny that, and you have a duty that you owe to the truth.”

There was a silence, while Bunny tried to face the appalling idea of opposing Dad, as Paul had opposed old Mr. Watkins. It had seemed so right in the one case, and seemed so impossible in the other!

At last Paul went on. “I know how it is, son. You won’t do it, you haven’t the nerve for it—you’re soft.” He waited, while those cruel words sank in. “Yes, that’s the word, soft. You’ve always had everything you wanted—you’ve had it handed to you on a silver tray, and it’s made you a weakling. You have a good heart, and you know what’s right, but you couldn’t bear to act, you’d be too afraid of hurting somebody.”

And that was the end of their talk. Paul had nothing more to say, and Bunny had no answer. Tears had come into his eyes—and that was weak, wasn’t it? He turned his head away, so that Paul might not see them.

“Well,” said the latter, “I’ve got a pile of work to do, so I’ll be off. This fight will be over some day, and your father will go on making money, and I hope it will bring you happiness, but I doubt it, really. Good-bye, son.”

“Good-bye,” said Bunny, feebly; and Paul turned on his heel and hurried away.

Bunny walked on, and there was a fever in his soul. He was enraged because of Paul’s lack of understanding, his cruel harshness; but all the time another voice inside him kept insisting, “He’s right! You’re soft, you’re soft—that’s the word for it!” Here, you see, was the thing in Bunny which made his sister Bertie so absolutely furious; that Bunny subjected himself to Paul, that he was willing to let Paul kick him, and to take it meekly. He was so utterly without sense of the dignity which his father’s millions conferred upon him!