I watched the city pass by around the open sides of the trolley, exuberant at the wind whipping through my loose tendrils of hair and caressing my face. I could feel the trolley wheel above hitting every frog (as Jet had told me the electrical line connections were called). Then I noticed a man only two seats in front of me turn as another man, clearly a laborer, addressed him, grinning, with a hand extended for a shake, though I could not quite make out what was said. I recognized that profile! Thick black hair covered by a porkpie hat, long rectangular face with square jaw, an ill-fitting suit and sunken eyes and cheeks from ill health but still he managed a smile for the other man, though it was almost obscured by his thick, black, handlebar mustache. He took the laborer's hand with a smile that was all at once weary and genuine and spoke to the man a moment as though they were old friends, his sparkling eyes never wavering from the man's face.

"That's Hugh O'Donnell!" I cried to Det. Ewing, almost shouting over the din of wind in my ears and the clacking of the car on the tracks. He didn't the trolley slowed to a stop I cried out loudly in my best imitation of an American accent, "Mr. O' Donnell? Mr. Hugh O'Donnell?"

He turned in his seat and granted me a smile that might have been more charming but for the weariness in his eyes. "Yes?"

"Thank God for you, Mr. O' Donnell! My husband is a millworker"

"Which mill?"

"He was in Duquesne, but lately we've moved to Pittsburgh. He was very upset that they conceded to Carnegie." I said, recalling the recent capitulation of the Duquesne Union to Carnegie steel.

"It's a pity what happened in Duquesne."

"What brings you downtown?" I asked.

"I wish I could say it was good news. I have an appointment with the attorney representing the Amalgamated Association."

"Why?"

"It's not important," he flashed a disarming smile, "only another ploy of Mr. Frick. Nothing will come of it." While his words were filled with confident dismissal, his eyes betrayed him. It must be something rather serious. Perhaps what he had predicted had come to pass, that he now found himself in trouble with the law. The trolley lurched forward, causing Mr. O'Donnell to jerk towards me. His hand flew to his porkpie hat. He stuck out his other hand. "Well, it was very nice to meet you. Give my regards to your husband."

I took his hand and shook it. "I will. Thank you Mr. O'Donnell."

"Call me Hughey," he shouted over the sound of the wrought iron wheels as they built up speed along the track. "Everybody does." He turned around and stared ahead as the trolley moved along.

I turned to Ewing only to find him staring at O'Donnell, body rigid, his face blanched of all color. Mr. O'Donnell stepped off at the Smithfield Street station. Our stop arrived soon after. We stepped off at Penn Avenue, not far from where I had met The Poet the day before. Ewing's shoulders were squared as he hopped from the baseboard. He offered me no hand as I descended. As the trolley departed, bell ringing twice, I caught up to him.

"Now then, what was that all about?"

"Nothin'" He tried to walk faster.

"Do you know him?"

"No. Not personally. But I've seen him before."

"Then why did you react in such a manner?"

He stopped, releasing a heavy sigh. "You know how I was there on one of the barges the day of the riot?"

"Yes, but what roll does Mr. O'Donnell play in all of this?"

"He was at the riverbank, you see. Don't know if you saw that scar on his thumb? That was me. Wasn't aimin' for his finger though. Meant to get his heart, but I missed." He missed? Georg never missed. I had watched him hammer in nails with his bullets For the first time I truly began to doubt that this was, in fact, Georg. "For a moment there, when he turned around, I was afraid he'd recognize me. I thought he got a pretty good look when I hit him. I s'pose not. Or he jest didn' notice me. I'll never forget him, though, that Saul holdin' the coats."

"What happened on the riverbank that day?"

He smirked ruefully. "Don't you know?"

"The papers were vague on that part."

"I s'pose they would be." Ewing took out a cigarette and lit it, taking a few puffs. "They want to gin up support for Amalgamated." His eyes focused somewhere in the distance, not on a particular place but some intangible moment in time. "Do you know what three hundred men trapped for the better part of a day in two oversized floating tin cans smells like? How the July heat cooks you like a can of beans in the fire with a hundred other men? You can't breathe. And you can't go out or they'll shoot you. And all around you is the smell of gunsmoke, the sickly scent of oil as it laps against the barges, the stench of a burning flat car loaded with oil. And all around you men are cryin' and men are wailin'. They don't know what they're doin', most of 'em would barely know how to hold a gun in the best of times. And this ain't the best of times. There's a man dying slow on the floor, bleeding out from a bullet wound in his arm. At first he was screamin', then moanin', and now he's jus' wimperin', his face white as a sheet and you know it won't be long."

He took a long drag. "And you're just waitin'. And it's just another war and you're tryin' ta figure how you'll get out of this one. Or if you will. Or even if you want to. Cause there'll always be another war. They're shootin' at you from all directions. And you see the face of every man or woman or kid who died at your hand and so you add another to their number and they brand you a murderer for it."

"That sounds like a nightmare."

"Not the worst I've ever had. Coulda been. You know that moment when you face your own mortality?"

I nodded.

"When the Homesteaders sent a burning flat car down the rail tracks to us, I felt it. As did every other man on those barges."

"Why didn't they jump off?"

"Seems like the reasonable thing to do, right? I'll tell you it was hardest thing I ever did to resist that urge. Wal, second only to burying the only family I had." He shrugged, staring straight ahead as he sucked in another breath full of smoke. "See, the Homesteaders, they had people on the bridge shootin' at us, people on skiffs on the river, jus' waiting for one of us to poke his head out of the metal covering like a groundhog poking its head out of its hole. They weren't about to let any of us get outta there alive."

"What do you mean?" I was baffled by this. "Would not it have been in their best interests to persuade the Pinkertons to leave and thereby end the fighting?"

"Jus' what I says. We tried to leave, the tug came to get us, American flag streamin' in the wind. They shot at it all the same, until it had to turn around and leave us behind. We tried to surrender, but every time someone would wave the white flag it'd be shot outta their hands."

"What did they mean by that?"

"Simple, Agent M. They meant to kill us. All of us. Like so many rats." His visage was dark. I could tell he had sunk too far into the memory to keep his head much longer. I needed to pull him back to the present, distract him. The topic could be revisited when O'Donnell's visage was not so fresh in his mind and the Homestead shore not so close.

"Would you call me, Mina? Normally I would not ask you to be so familiar, but you do understand."

He shrugged. "Don't want me ta know your last name. I understand. My name don't mean a thing, ain't no family attached to it to protect, so I have the luxury to give it freely." He tossed the cigarette butt on the ground and crushed it under his shoe. "Why don't we mosey on over to the Exposition Hall?"

We walked for a while before I spoke again. "You said you had fought in a war?"

"Did I?"

"Yes."

He thought back a moment. "Guess I did. Yep. Fought in the Indian Wars, US Army 7th Calvary."

"Not the Civil War?"

"How old do you think I am?"

"Sorry. There are so many wars it becomes difficult to remember the small civil ones."

He actually managed a laugh at that. "Don't let anyone round here hear you say that. As far as any American is concerned it's the biggest war that ever was. Frank fought in it. But don't tell him I told you. He'll talk your ear off with stories of him and General Sherman burning a swath to the sea. Came all the way down from Minnesota to serve under him. Before then he was with the Le Sueur Tigers. Saw some things no man should ever see fighting the Sioux up there. One of the first men Sherman recruited to help him with the Indian problem. He did a tour of duty at Ft. Dodge afore he was contacted by the Pinkertons."

"Mr. Bond tells me he was an Indian Agent?"

"Yeah. Guess he got tired of fightin' them. I don't blame him. One tour was enough to cure me of it as well. It's fine enough to shoot men on a battlefield, but women and children? He knows six or seven languages, all told."

"So, you must tell me the story of how you saved his life."

He smirked. "I'd rather tell you bout what happened on the riverbank."

The more I spoke to him the more I became convinced that perhaps it were just a strange resemblance between he and Georg. Where Georg had been the very definition of taciturn, Tom was almost overly talkative, remarking on everything in his comfortable, easy manner. Now that O'Donnell's influence had been exorcised and he was back to himself I found it much like speaking with an old friend. It was difficult to believe I had only met him this morning.

"Would you like ta go by way of the park? We could watch the riverboats and barges pass by. Mebbe buy some boiled peanuts. I'll tell you, on a day like this ain't nothin' better than to stand on the Union Bridge eatin' peanuts and throwin' the shells down onto the coal barges."

"I thought we were going to Exposition Hall?"

"Sure we will. I'm jest thinkin' you might be hungry and food inside the Exposition is expensive."

Now that he mentioned it, I noticed the black emptiness of my stomach. I had only eaten peanuts once before, Jet had purchased them for us at the boardwalk. As I recalled they were fairly decent when one was hungry. "Perhaps that would be a good idea, thank you, Mr. Ewing."

"Tom. It's only fair if I gotta call you Mina that you should call me Tom." He smiled a charming, lopsided smile.

"Thank you, Tom, then."

Tom purchased a sack of peanuts and we ate them as we watched the river flow by underneath. Tom cracked the nuts with his teeth and sucked out the innards, lining the shells up along the rail. I found the shells more of a challenge for my fingers but refused to demur to such barbarities. Shell pieces littered the wooden planks at my feet. A large black barge filled with coal of almost the same shade passed beneath us, a blue and white tug smoking out ahead of it.

"There! See if you can land one on the coal," Tom said, handing me one of his shells. I gingerly took it between two gloved fingers, holding it out in front of me in mild disgust. It had been in his mouth. He threw one down. "Yeah! First try!" Given how large the barge was and how low the bridge this seemed less something to celebrate than to expect. "Now you go." He looked almost childlike in his eagerness. I released the shell. A gust of wind from below the bridge caught it and blew it into the water. "So close!" he said.

"Give me another one," I said. He obliged. I threw it down, but the wind once more stole it into the river.

"You gotta account fer the wind," Tom said. "See?" He tossed his with a slight arc, causing it to land just on the edge of the barge.

"Fine. Let me try it again." I reached for his shells.

"Hey, use yer own!" He cried, blocking me.

"I don't have any!" I protested.

"Well, make some."

I bit into a shell and dumped out the nut into my hand, tossing the shell down in an arching motion. The tiny object landed on top of a black pile of coal. I smiled triumphantly and popped the nut into my mouth.

"There, now ya got it." He laughed.

We passed the next few moments in this manner until the barge finally crept out of range. Which was just as well for we were almost out of nuts. He turned, leaning his elbows against the wooden rail. "You asked about the Monster of the Mon. There's a good deal of talk about that in Allegheny City. Just whispers, really. A couple of the younger guys in particular. Mostly friends of August Pirnack, not that you'd know who that is."

"So it is real?"

"So far as I can tell. Or at least, somethin' like that. The stories don't particularly agree. Some say it's a person, a murderer like Jack the Ripper. Some say it's an anarchist group, but if it is it's not one I've heard about. Nor any other of our agents for that matte, which is really sayin' somethin'."

"Are there many anarchist groups?" I asked.

"More than I thought there would be. Seems you find one and two more splinter off from it. 'Specially round Allegheny. Seems like every other saloon is hosting a club."

"Is that what the note the tall man passed you a note that you slipped into your back pocket after we arrived was regarding?" I asked.

"What note?" he asked innocently, but he could not resist surreptitiously checking his pocket. A look of horror flitted across his face as he realized it was missing.

I smiled, producing a small slip of paper from my sleeve. "Meurer, 49 Spring Garden, 8pm," I read aloud.

"What? When did you-?" He grabbed for the slip.

"When you believed I was trying to steal your peanut shells."

He was speechless a moment. "Why you dirty thief!"

"That does explain why you wanted to take me to the bridge almost as soon as we had arrived, he did appear impatient with waiting at the other end of the bridge."

"Well, we weren't exactly anticipating that I would have to visit the morgue when we arranged the meet last Tuesday. So you saw him straight off, huh?"

"He's not exactly inconspicuous at that height, even in those brown clothes. And it is not exactly common for a man to simply be leaning against a bridge beam for five minutes before deciding to walk across. I can only guess you invited me along so you would appear less so than he."

"You caught me. Yeah, standin' in the middle of a bridge alone just standin' tends to draw the attention. And what with evr'yone on edge about spies and all, well, can't be too careful. Nobody's gonna think anything of a man and a woman on a walk though."

"So who was that man?"

"Detective Wilbur Evans. He's been embedded here for almost a year with Group number two of the Allegheny Anarchists. They say he worked the Haymarket case as well. He was the one who convinced our informant to come forward."

"A year?" I was shocked. How long had they been anticipating the strike?

"Don't go deceivin' yourself to think this was all the strike, the Pinkertons have been watchin' the anarchist situation in Pittsburgh and Allegheny for some time now. We have another who's been here eight months. Official estimates are five hundred anarchists in Allegheny alone, but Will say's there's more'n that, in particulars in Deutschtown and Wood's Run where the Germans are. Will can't pass as German but he thinks I can, though I don't speak a lick of it."

"Aren't you German?" I asked.

"If I am mama never done told me."

"I just assumed with the jaw and all."

"Guess I could be. Don't rightly know what I am. Guess I'm what they call an American. You know, a man without a home country."

"What does the address mean?"

"It's a saloon, Henry Bauer was friends with the owner."

"Henry Bauer?"

"He and his pals, Knold and Eckert helped Berkman when he got here. We know there's more, but he was stayin' with them a while. Anyways, seems he's managed to pull some strings and get me into one of their meetings. Goddamn though! You saw him pass me the note? I coulda sworn you were lookin' out at the incline. Remember, I even pointed it out."

"So naturally that would be the last place I looked," I said.

"You Secret Service types are way too keen."

"Just experienced," I said. "Remember, I've been about this since I was eighteen."

"That long? And Mr. Bond?"

"Since he was twenty, I believe."

"And here I am startin' just two months ago."

"You've made remarkable progress."

"If'n you say so. Hey, you wanna go see the exposition?"

"Do you have another meeting?" I teased, though not without true suspicion.

"Nah, jus' figured might be good to talk a bit more. You did want to hear about what happened at Homestead. I'd hate to disappoint a lady such as yourself."

It was so strange to walk on the other side of the street from where I had been only last night. The same gulf seemed just as true from the giant red brick with its shining white trim and gleaming glass and steel as it had on the side of the slums only yards away. I felt I could no more cross over the street to the one than I had been able to the other. The building was impressive in the way of a colonial structure, the front facade bringing to mind a modern church but for the rear of the building which was a rather fascinating structure made almost entirely of steel and glass, reflecting the river and city from its sides. Tom guided me to a large brick facade trimmed in white moulding that stood in slight relief from the front of the building with three large entryways as towering as those of a cathedral. I could not help looking up in awe at the massive portal as we passed through it into a room of bromalaids and blooming exotic flowers. People milled about to the strains of a string quintet playing classical tunes. Booths of every type lined the path, some decorated to match the exotic wares they were selling, others selling popcorn, and still others meant as decorative advertisement. Small garden areas trailed between booths, Parapets, domes and spires rose up, reaching above the second story railings which looked down upon the visitors. It was certainly no Crystal Palace, but it held a charm in its own right.

Tom extended his elbow out toward me and, smiling, I took it in hand. To any passerby we were indistinguishable from a couple enjoying a stroll through the indoor park. Our conversation of no consequence to those who might otherwise be tempted to listen.

"Now then, I guess I should start from the beginning. Which, I guess would be when I signed up in Chicago. I saw a poster recruitin' for a job, didn' say what kind. I said to myself, well any job's better'n starvin' to death. Hadn't held a position since my enlistment expired ya see. So I signed up. Easy money, got me outta Chicago, seemed like a good decision. Won't say it was the worst of my life, but it's definitely on the list. I shoulda know somethin' was up when they didn' see fit ta tell me even after I had signed my name. But they didn't an' I didn't ask. From what the other's said when we all got to Bellevue station ain't none of us were told 'cept that we were gettin' on these two covered barges and we'd be pulled down the river by a tug to our location in the middle of the night to arrive in the mornin'. One of the barges Iron Mountain was mostly sleepin' quarters - that was the one I was on when it all went to hell - the other had tables and a kitchen with twenty waiters, that was the Monongahela. Wasn't badly outfitted, neither. They had crates of uniforms and other crates of guns for when we got there. There was a man, Captain Heinde, in charge of the outfit. He was an arrogant sonuva- pardon - sonuva gun. Typical of the type, I guess. It all was goin' fine, but, ah don't know, somethin' about the way that deputy spoke to Captain Heinde didn't set right with me. Shrugged it off. Though Heinde seemed a bit jittery. Honestly, at that point I was jus' thinkin' of the promise of a hot meal served by real waiters."

"It was real nice. Better food then a lot of us had eaten in months, decent beds. But I still jus' couldn't get over the way Heinde was actin' like he expected somethin' at any moment. I'd seen captains get like that. Saw it at Pine Ridge. Where it's like they know sumpin' you don't and if'n ya did ya prob'ly wouldn't be there with 'em. Kept me from sleeping. Reckon it was good it did. We didn't know what it was or even that it was till we reached what I learned later was the Smithfield street bridge. You know, the blue one that looks like a weird pair of eyes starin' at you."

I had to admit I knew exactly which bridge he meant.

"Saw some men movin' as they saw us approach. Get up an' start runnin'. Warn't ten minutes later we heard the long whine of a factory whistle. I think a lot of us knew at that moment. Not exactly what was coming - no one there coulda predicted that or we woulda jumped off those barges into the river whether Heinde shot us or not - but you know that sinking feeling you get?"

I nodded. I knew exactly the sensation. The moment you knew a mission was about to fall apart and you would be lucky to escape with your skin.

"Wasn't more'n a few minutes when a little steamer pulled up ahead of us. Seemed a bit strange ta see a steamer so late at night. As it approached I and a few others saw the men inside pull out rifles. There was scarce enough time to get to cover before they fired on us. Then they blew their whistle, long and high. A moment later another from somewhere on the shore answered it, though it was too dark to see from where. Then another whistled and another until the whole night air was filled with their howls. And one by one the lights started comin' on on the hillside, like star poppin' out in the night sky. That was when we saw the salamander, long and fiery start to grow, snaking its way along toward the place we were distressed to find we were headed. Men rushed to the crates to grab guns and uniforms."

He stopped, took out another cigarette and lit it without letting go of my arm. "We hadn't even reached the dock when the first shots were fired from the shore. I heard the sound of breaking glass and bullets hitting metal as the men from the tug boat, the Little Bill dove for cover. Heinde assured us they had built a fence around the works, that once we were at the bank we'd be safe." He took a long drag on his cigarette. "The Homesteaders went through that fence like it was made of paper."

"It wasn't just workers and men there neither. There were women and kids, and not older kids but these women - some were holdin' a baby in one hand an' a gun in the other. There was even this old lady with a billy club. I remember her cause she gave me this." He pointed to an puffy line of scar flesh above his brow. "Kept screechin' 'bout dirty black sheep. Did worse to some of the others. But that was later."

"They didn't eve wait till we had made the wharf before the whole of the town met us there with muskets and rifles blazing. We fired a few rounds back. Then it all went quiet. But not the good kind. The eerie kind when you know sumpin's gonna happen and you can only wait for it. The Monongahela sent out their largest man, big as John Sullivan he was and pacing the deck, starin' at the Homesteaders as if darin' them to even try an' shoot him. Then came a shout from the shore, not from a man, but a woman. She was joined in a chorus of heavenly voices spewin' the most ugly and vile things you ever heard. These Homestead angels cussed and cursed, rainin' stones from above at our barges."

He exhaled a plume of smoke. "It was then the crowd got real quiet and O'Donnell stepped forward. I'll never forget it. Told us the men of Homestead were peaceably inclined. Recommended we send a committee ashore. Given what they had already done, what they would do, who knows what the would have done to a committee? He warned us that whatever we did we must not land or there would be bloodshed. I think most of us on the barges were willing to consider his suggestion. A lot of men were already talkin' how they didn't sign up to be shot at. It was then Capt. Heinde stepped out onto the deck of the Iron Mountain, the barge I was on and declared that we were agents of the Pinkerton Agency and that we had been sent to take possession of the property and guard it. I could tell from a few of the faces hidin' under the beds that this was the first time they were hearin' 'xactly what it was they had been recruited for. Then he told them we'd be goin' up there to the works and if they didn't withdraw we would mow every one of them down."

Tom threw his cigarette but on the path and crushed it with his shoe, driving it down until it was merely a spot of pale ash. "Don't know who he expected to mow them down, most of the men were too scared to do anything but cower on the floor of the barge. But it sounded impressive enough to stir the remainder of 'em. Unfortunately it was a speech better at rallying the Homesteaders. Took five men behind O' Donnell to hold 'em back so they wouldn't trample over their leader in their eagerness. Then O'Donnell said, 'I have no more to say. What you do here is at the risk of many lives. Before you enter those mills, you will trample over the dead bodies of three thousand honest workingmen.' You could see the fires of thousands of lanterns and torches glowing all around us. On both sides of the shore, from the bridges, and in the distance more fiery snakes formed to provide assistance. Let's sit for a while." He gestured to a bench and I was glad to have a seat upon it. He stepped up onto the seat of the bench, setting himself on the edge of the back, like he was sitting on a fence post. I noticed he was not wearing normal shoes but heeled leather boots with something of a squared toe. He took out another cigarette and lit it.

He exhaled heavily. "Capt. Heinde gave the order to lower the gangplank. That was when I grabbed a gun from the crate and hid myself behind the wall next to the deck so I could shoot out if the Homesteaders kept their word. Wal, a contingent of 'em, mebbe six in all, approached the gangplank and that was when Heinde told them we were comin' ashore and they couldn't stop us. One of 'em, a smaller man shouted something back like, 'Come on, and you'll come over my carcass!' and threw himself down on the gangplank with his revolver cocked and pointed at Heinde. I'm not sure he'd ever used that thing to shoot a man, but he looked like he'd had enough liquid courage to try. Of course, Capt. Heinde didn't care much for his little demonstration and brought his billy club down on the man's head. You could hear shouts from O'Donnell and his men to 'Get back!' not that it had much effect on the mob. Heinde ordered us forward and stepped onto the shore like he was confident three hundred men would follow him. He should watched where he was goin'. Set his foot on an oar and slipped, and the darn thing sprung up and hit some big slav in the jaw and knocked him out. It would have been a laugh had it not been exactly the wrong time for it to happen."

"I guess they could forgive the strike against the man on the gangplank but that second one was one too many. A man with a club rushed from the crowd and slammed Heinde with it. KNocked him right off his feet. Couldn't tell you exactly what happened next, there were two shots and the next thing I knew Heinde and the man on the gangplank were both bleedin'. One of the other captains, Cooper, I think, shouted the order for us to open fire. Might as well have been orderin' the Homesteaders cause they didn't wait for us to start to fire back. I took aim at O' Donnell who had left himself wide open. It was a perfect shot. Clean. Right through the heart." He pointed his thumb to the center of his chest, spilling ash from his cigarette onto his trousers. "Any kid coulda made it. But just as I was about to shoot another man knocked my arm an' I only grazed his thumb." He spat behind us. "A man went down in front of me, I pulled him in, bleedin' badly as he was. I fired a few more rounds into the crowd. Hard to say what missed and what hit in that mess."

"In less'n ten minutes it was over. Over a dozen Homesteaders were lyin' on the shore, some dead. Some dying. You could hear their cries from the barge. On our side weren't much different. I counted at least a dozen shot, probably more, not counting Captain Heinde who had clawed his way over the gangplank where one of the officers yanked him back on deck. Some of the Pinkerton commanders wanted to launch another assault but Potter, the good superintendent, wouldn't hear of having more blood on his hands without the sheriff's go ahead. So there we sat, waiting, while the Homesteaders carried away their wounded and dead behind a makeshift barricade of iron bricks. A few of the men on the barge asked Potter if we might head back from where we came, but he assured them that it looked like the Advisory Committee had the crowd under control and soon negotiations could take place. I guess he really believed that because he sent the tug away with Capt. Heinde and the other wounded."

"Course I wasn't about ta believe that anymore'n the others were. We could hear clear as day those Homesteaders callin' to 'Kill the Pinkertons.' I took out my knife an started cuttin' a window into the side of the barge. If they were gonna shoot me, I wanted to at least be able ta give 'em a fight. A number of the other men, the ones not hidin' under their beds, did the same. I saw O'Donnell directin' the women to leave, they weren't too keen on the idea but they did go. That was when I knew it was time to reload my Winchester. He was conferrin' with a couple'a other men, they were directin' the others about in a way that was none too encouraging. Settin' up fortifications and the like. Didn't matter what Potter said, it was clear to every man on that barge that there wasn't gonna be any negotiations. And there we were, floatin' in a tin can on the shore, no way out. Jest waitin'." Tom dropped his cigarette to the ground and lit a third.

"I suppose they decided the best thing they could do was make short work of us before we could get reinforcements. I caught the words 'national guard' a few times. They surrounded our barges with skiffs, shootin' at any man who so much as showed a toe out of cover. After a few hours, one of our captains decided to make another go of it and made his intentions known to the Homesteaders. Wal, you can imagine how that went over. Words were hardly out of his mouth before they began shooting. We fired back. It was then I heard the cannon from the other side of the river boom for the first time. The ball tore right through the metal covers like paper."

"That was when panic set in on the barges. Men went crazed. Took everything jus' to keep 'em from jumpin' into the river where the men on skiffs were waiting. The shootin' began at eight and didn't really stop after that. Minutes jus' passin' by one after another, turning to hours and hours. Moanin' from the wounded. Death all around us. Watched a cannonball strike the works, saw it send a piece of iron right through a man's head. It was enough to make even the sanest man start to lose his mind." He was staring at one of the booths, but his gaze never fell upon it. The cigarette between his fingers slowly turned to ash and wilted.

"What did you do?" I asked, almost afraid to know his part.

"Ah slept."

"You what?" I was all astonishment, I could not have heard him right.

"I'd been up since Chicago, I was tired. Nothin' was changin' anytime soon so I jest set myself down and had a nap. Wasn't like they wouldn't wake me if somethin' happened."

What sort of man could consider a hail of bullets a suitable lullaby? I marveled to myself.

He continued the tale, telling how the tug returned for them, how it had fled in a hail of bullets before reaching them. How the sight of it's flag vanishing in the distance left the men on the barges devastated. About the hysteria as they had watched the Homesteaders fill a raft with lumber and set it alight, drifting toward the barges with the intent to set them aflame as was once done to the Spanish fleet in the British Channel. This had proved unsuccessful, as had a second attempt to send a flaming flat car into the barges, which had only managed to roll as far as the water's edge before stopping. He told how the captains threatened to shoot anyone who jumped from the barges into the water. The attempts by the Homesteaders to dynamite the barges. Of the Homesteaders pouring oil into the river with the intent to set it on fire. How the hail of bullets never ceased. How one of those bullets hit a man who had been cowering under cover with his head in his hands. He described the moans and cries of agony as the man slowly bled to death on the floor of the barge, the red liquid life flowing onto the floor, sticking to their shoes. How this had finally convinced the others on the barge to formally surrender, and how their white flags had been shot from their hands when they tried.

"They refused to allow you to surrender?" I asked. He nodded. "Why?"

"Reckon they wanted us dead before the authorities could intervene."

"But three hundred men!"

"Wouldn't've made a difference if we were three thousand men. We killed seven of 'em and they were going to make each one of us pay for 'em as if we had shot 'em personally. Which, consequently, I had."

"You did mention that."

"His name was John Morris. He had a wife and kids."

"You know his name?"

"I know 'em all, even the ones we didn't kill that died because of us. I'm so tired of killing."

"I understand."

"You've killed a man."

"A few, yes."

"I still remember my first one, when I was sixteen. His name was William."

"My first was a German man named Gregory. I still remember his eyes, just staring, the city lights reflecting in them. Thinking how much they looked like stars. I've replayed it hundreds of times, trying to find another way. But he was about to shoot my partner, I had no choice." There came no flicker of recognition from my partner. I had half expected he would pull his gun on me right then. But all he did was look in his cigarette case for another and, upon finding it empty, took out a piece of rolling paper and rolled a sizable pinch of tobacco up in it to form a new one.

He lit the cigarette. "We can't change what we've done. Only live with it, I guess."

"I suppose so. What happened then? As you are still alive I can assume they did eventually allow your surrender."

"A man came from the national office of the union. He called for them to let us go. Worked about as well as those white flags. Then O'Donnell appeared on top of a pile of steel beams holding a giant American flag like he was some sort of paragon of the working man and commanded silence. The Homesteaders claim O'Donnell wasn't the leader of the mob, but I'll tell you, if you had seen how they cheered him when he appeared, how they even took their hats off jest to hear him speak, you wouldn't wonder that he was. Well the short of it is they agreed to let us off the barges, so long as we were surrendered to their custody until the sheriff could come get us. Under the condition we would be tried for murder." He threw his cigarette on the ground, only half smoked. "He assured us that if we surrendered under these conditions we would not be harmed."

"Our captains objected, but we could not bear to wait for our deaths like so many rats in a trap any longer. Again we raised the white flag and this time they allowed us to surrender. I wish I could say that was the end of it, but as bad as everything had been up until this point, it somehow managed to get even worse. The walk to the opera house was probably the longest walk of my life. It was clear O' Donnell's words were worth less than the time it took to speak 'em."

"They led us out from the barges with a man taking charge of each of us, like we was prisoners. I remember the moment I emerged from the barge, hands up. A man grabbed me roughly by the arm and took my gun from its holster. Then he yanked me down the gang plank so hard I fell in the water to the hoots and jeers of the crowd. That was when a rock got me above the eye. Could see much after that on account of the blood on one side. The man pulled me out of the water and threw me before the crowd. Fists flew at me from every angle. I felt sticks and clubs as I was pulled through the crush of people all doing their very best to get in their blow for my crime. I couldn't see anything but hands and bodies and clubs. Jest had to follow where I was being pulled from a man I could scarcely see. I felt rocks pelting me from behind, bouncing off my coat and hat. I tripped over another detective who was lying curled on the ground. There was only a bloody hole where his eye had been. A man, much like the one dragging me was jeering at him, trying to get a hold of his arm to pull him back up, but the detective clamped them to his side even as a barrage of kicks assaulted him from every angle. They flew at me as well, striking me in the side, the face, hard boots, pointed ladies shoes, even bare feet. My guard jerked me to my feet and continued to pull me through the gauntlet. I remember taking a hard blow to the gut that nearly knocked me off my feet, but I kept my ground and kept going."

"We emerged through the gate of the steelworks into the town and then our miseries truly began. We were set upon by the townspeople with all the fury of wolves starvin' for blood. I remember we reached a building that I later found out was union headquarters, the Bost building, an the man guiding me stopped, punched me in the gut and told me to remove my hat and salute the flag. I couldn't even see the flag but I reached for my hat. Wasn't fast enough for his liking and he tore it from my head and threw it on the ground, then pointed and shouted 'salute' so I did as best I could and he laughed and jerked me along. I stopped even bein' able to feel the pain anymore, just the dull thud of unceasing blows. I can't tell you the relief I felt when I was finally thrown through the doors of the Opera house and the blows finally ceased. I landed amongst a pile of men, some of whom I recognized from the Iron Mountain, some I didn't, some I couldn't for how badly beaten they were. But we were safe. Until the Homesteaders started tryin' to get in that is. "

"The man next to me told me 'This is it. They're going to kill us.' And I don't believe he was wrong. Had they been allowed in they would have probably torn us limb from limb eventually. That was when the guards finally decided we'd had enough and threatened to shoot the next person who came at us. Pitiful bloodied creatures that we were. Eventually, all of us were in and that was where we stayed with nary a nurse to tend our wounds until Sheriff McCleary arrived at midnight to escort us by train to the county jail. At least, so we thought."

"That was when Frank saw me, he was on the train waiting to receive us. The Pinkerton Agency sent him to evaluate the situation. I was a sorry sight by any measure, but he recognized me. Asked how would I like to join him in the investigation. 'Anything ta keep my head outta the noose," I says. When the train stopped at the station, he smuggled me off. From what I heard the rest of the men were secreted away in the middle of the night. Don't know what became of most of 'em. A few filed claims against the Pinkertons sayin' if they'd known what they were in for they wouldn't've signed up. The agency contacted Frick about it and he just told them it was their own fault and none of his responsibility that we weren't told. Don't mistake me, I want to get to the bottom of this rumor about Carnegie, but I wouldn't mind popping Frick one in the face myself after what he put us through."

"I can't say that I blame you."

He stood up and extended a hand to me. "It's gettin' rather late in the mornin'. What's say we get some popcorn and then send you on the train back."

I nodded and took his hand. "That sounds a fine idea," I said, squashing the pile of cigarette butts and ash under my shoe as I followed his lead.