Haymarket (27 page)

“It isn’t about tonight,” Lizzie said. “I regret hurting you … if in fact I did. But I agree it would have been wrong for me to disguise my honest reaction to Albert’s letter.”

Lucy stopped doing chores and sat down in one of the armchairs. “But then what is it, my dear?” The aloofness in her voice had evaporated, replaced by puzzled concern.

“It’s about William and me,” Lizzie said softly, sitting down in the other chair.

“Have you set a date?” Lucy asked, suddenly full of interest.

“As a matter of fact, yes.” Lizzie said, looking strangely unhappy.

“What wonderful news!” Lucy said, grabbing her friend’s hand. “But my dear, why in heaven’s name do you look so … gloomy?”

“Because we’ll be moving out of the city,” Lizzie blurted out, and the tears gushed from her eyes.

Lucy reacted as if physically struck. “Moving? Moving where, for heaven’s sake? Your place is here, here in Chicago, in the movement, here with us! You’re my dearest, dearest friend!”

“We’re not going far,” Lizzie said, dabbing at her eyes with a handkerchief. “And we’ll still be active in the struggle; William feels as strongly about that as I do. But … it’s not like being around the corner from you …” She started to sob, and Lucy put her arms around her.

“Where are you moving to—Alaska?!”

“Geneva … It’s only some forty miles away. And now there’s daily commuter service on the Illinois Central.”

“But why, why Geneva of all places?”

Trying to get hold of herself, Lizzie disengaged from Lucy’s arms. “William’s inherited a small house there. He hopes to open a school for shorthand and elocution. I could give music lessons.” She hesitated for a moment. “The doctors have told him that the country air will do wonders for his health.”

“I didn’t know William was ill. My word, tonight’s been one surprise after another!”

“Digestive problems. The doctors haven’t been able to come up with a clear diagnosis and none of their potions have helped.”

“Oh, Lizzie, how I’ll miss you!” With a sudden wail, Lucy buried her head in Lizzie’s lap. Lizzie had never seen her friend cry before and the shock of it was profound.

“Oh, my love, my love … it’ll all come right … I’m sure it will … nothing can keep me away from you … you’ll see … And I’ll be at every meeting, every one!”

Gradually stifling her tears, Lucy sat back up. “You are very dear to me … do you know that? Do you realize how important you are to me, Lizzie, how much I love you?”

“I do. Truly I do. As important as you are to me.”

“Because if you didn’t know, I would have only myself to blame. I can be so rude and angry.”

“That’s because your soul is so large, dearest. It registers all the world’s hurt. And in your own life you’ve had to experience more wrongs than most of us. Your anger’s been earned.”

She hugged Lucy fiercely, then eased away. “And you needn’t worry about the dress shop, either. If it continues to grow, I could do some piecework in Geneva. It would be a nice relief from all those talentless piano students.”

Tears started pouring down Lizzie’s cheeks. The two women again embraced, holding each other in silence for a long, long time.

Lizzie and William Holmes’s departure from Chicago in November 1885 coincided with the height of the economic depression—and the rapid spread of worker resistance. Strikes, speeches, rallies, organizations, publications, and parades multiplied. Hundreds of thousands of workers, many unskilled or semi-skilled, flocked to join the Knights of Labor. Others, more militant, joined the International and founded a host of new
IWPA
chapters, while still others, with the privileges of a professional craft to protect, lined up behind Samuel Gompers in focusing on the rights of skilled workers. Parsons, declaring himself a “revolutionary socialist” as well as an advocate of trade unionism, stressed in his speeches the importance of organizing, whether the channel be the unions, the Knights, or the International.

The movement for an eight-hour day, long dormant, also sprang back to exuberant life in the winter of 1886. “Eight hours for work, eight hours for sleep, eight hours for what we will!” became the dominant rallying cry of an aroused working class, the central metaphor for achieving a better life. Albert was among the first in the
IWPA
to awaken to its appeal, and he soon brought Spies—who initially feared siphoning off political energy into so “limited” a demand—with him.

“After all,” Albert argued, “we don’t want to be seen as stubborn utopians who refuse to lend our weight to a movement that promises immediate relief from daily suffering.”

“I suppose we can view the eight-hour movement as historically inevitable,” Spies said, finding for himself a palatable argument, “a necessary stage in the evolution of worker consciousness.”

Parsons didn’t believe in “inevitabilities,” but did want Spies on his side. “Think of it this way,” he said, “the drive for an eight-hour day could well create the class unity that up to now has eluded us.”

Inspector John Bonfield was feeling enormously pleased with himself. He’d hatched yet another scheme for securing future income. With a contribution of five hundred dollars from each of the officers in his cabal, he’d bribe the state legislature to pass a lucrative pension bill that would guarantee policemen with twenty years of service a retirement sum equal to half their salaries. True, five hundred dollars was an enormous amount of money for an officer to raise whose yearly salary was only slightly more than double that, but Bonfield had a canny solution for that little dilemma, too. For those interested in joining up, he would make loans available at minimal interest; the money would come from the police department’s substantial slush fund, built up from the sale of unclaimed property, saloon licenses, and fines collected for assorted violations of the law. Bonfield felt confident that with hearty support from his fellow officers, the legislature would pass the pension bill at its upcoming session.

Several other enterprises currently commanded his attention. All emanated from his close connection to Mike McDonald, the city’s gambling czar, a man with fingers in so many pies that doing any bit of illicit baking in Chicago without his first lighting the stove was very nearly impossible. McDonald controlled dozens of wholesale liquor distributorships, owned an off-track betting emporium, was deeply invested in various bail-bonding rackets, and was the sole owner of a high-stakes gambling establishment that catered to the more affluent of the city’s sporting men, offering them dice, cards, brandy, cigars, and gourmet food. McDonald employed dozens of “bunko men”—hustlers—to hang out at railroad stations and hotel lobbies to entice prosperous-looking out-of-towners to an evening of chance. Chicago’s lesser gaming establishments were allowed to remain in business on the stipulation that they pay McDonald a monthly percentage. In 1885, he bought a splendid mansion on Ashland Avenue, one of the city’s most fashionable areas.

Bonfield was one of the key officials McDonald relied on for protection from police interference, for ensuring suspended sentences for any of his bunko men who might end up in a police court, and for securing friendly and influential witnesses on the rare occasions when McDonald himself might be brought into court for a legal infraction. In return, McDonald saw to it that Bonfield and other cooperative officials were handsomely
compensated, sometimes through direct payments, sometimes through shares in one of his enterprises, whether it be counterfeiting, loan sharking, fencing, or the routine shakedown of street peddlers and prostitutes.

Bonfield disliked visiting the Harrison Street lockup. He didn’t approve of police stations being used as places of shelter for the city’s homeless. Many were recent immigrants, meaning, to Bonfield, troublemakers and radical scum, too lazy to stick to a job or too high-and-mighty to do manual labor. Still, once a month, in his role as inspector, he was required to visit the Harrison facilities.

As he walked down the row of cells, his questions to the guards were, as usual, perfunctory.

“You’re not allowing any of the homeless to spend more than a single night, are you?”

“No, sir. We tell ’em that when they arrive asking for shelter: ‘Just one night, after that it’s the workhouse.’ ”

“How many to a cell?”

“Most times, ten. It’s all we can squeeze in, the space being five by seven.”

“Vermin under control?”

“Usual number of rats and mice.”

“I meant the vagrants,” Bonfield said laconically.

The turnkey dutifully laughed, not having heard the joke for a full month. “Yes sir, we lock ’em in all night.”

“Each cell has a bucket for bodily functions?”

“Yes, sir.”

“The air smells foul. Probably coming off the vagrants, not the buckets.”

“I expect so, sir.”

“What time are they chased out?”

“Six
A.M
., sir. After breakfast.”

“You give them breakfast?” Bonfield looked outraged. “Who authorized that? Breakfast’s not required by law.”

The turnkey smiled slyly. “It’s only for them we rouse early to polish our boots.”

From the cell behind Bonfield, a voice suddenly pierced the gloom. “I spit it in your face.”

Bonfield whirled around. Peering into the dark cell, he yelled, “Who said that?”

When no one answered, he turned to the guard. “Did you recognize the voice? It had a thick German accent.”

“Yes, sir,” the guard answered wearily. “He’s been giving us trouble most of the night. Wanted water, things like that.”

“Bring him out here at once!” Bonfield ordered, fingering his club.

The turnkey opened the lock, but before he could enter the cell, a young man stepped forward voluntarily. He was an imposing figure, despite the dirt on his clothes from having lain all night on the floor. Strongly built, with a handsome head, his eyes were at once hooded and intense.

“Yes?” he said staring directly at Bonfield, as he stepped from the cell.

“What’s your name?”

“Louis Lingg.”

“Where are you from?”

“Ich komme gericht von—”

Bonfield swung his club hard against Lingg’s shoulder, causing him momentarily to lose balance. “Speak English, you god-damn Kraut! This is the United States of America!”

Lingg’s facial muscles twitched with anger. Bonfield circled around him, slapping the club against his palm as he alternately cursed Lingg and plied him with questions. Lingg stood silently erect, glaring straight ahead. He refused to say another word, even when Bonfield pushed the club painfully into his ribs.

“Don’t you know who I am, you stupid bastard? Bonfield’s the name. Ever hear it? All your anarchist friends have.” There was something in the obdurate way Lingg faced him down, silently, that convinced Bonfield on the spot that he was dealing with one of those terrorist swine. “ ‘Black Jack’ Bonfield, in honor of my fondness for smashing your kind in the head. Black Jack Bonfield. Don’t forget it!”

With that, Bonfield turned and marched back up the line of cells. As he reached the door, Lingg’s voice sounded loudly at his back: “I will remember.”