To Mary Craig Kimbrough To whose persistence in the perilous task of tearing her husband’s manuscript to pieces, the reader is indebted for the absence of most of the faults from this book....

Upton Sinclair is one of the not too many writers who have consecrated their lives to the agitation for social justice, and who have also enrolled their art in the service of a set purpose. A great an...

The town of Pedro stood on the edge of the mountain country; a straggling assemblage of stores and saloons from which a number of branch railroads ran up into the canyons, feeding the coal-camps. Thro...

The town of Pedro stood on the edge of the mountain country; a straggling assemblage of stores and saloons from which a number of branch railroads ran up into the canyons, feeding the coal-camps. Thro...

When Hal came to himself again he was in darkness, and was conscious of agony from head to toe. He was lying on a stone floor, and he rolled over, but soon rolled back again, because there was no part...

Hal Warner started to drag himself down the road, but was unable to make it. He got as far as a brooklet that came down the mountainside, from which he might drink without fear of typhoid; there he la...

Hal had now before him a week’s adventures as a hobo: a genuine hobo, with no ten dollar bill inside his belt to take the reality out of his experiences. He took stock of his worldly goods and wondere...

The mule is notoriously a profane and godless creature; a blind alley of Nature, so to speak, a mistake of which she is ashamed, and which she does not permit to reproduce itself. The thirty mules und...

For three days Hal toiled in the bowels of the mine, and ate and pursued vermin at Reminitsky’s. Then came a blessed Sunday, and he had a couple of free hours to see the sunlight and to get a look at ...

It chanced before many days that Hal got a holiday, relieving the monotony of his labours as stableman: an accidental holiday, not provided for in his bargain with the pit-boss. Something went wrong w...

Hal asked the name of his new acquaintance, and she told him it was Mary Burke. “Ye’ve not been here long, I take it,” she said, “or ye’d have heard of ‘Red Mary.’ ’Tis along of this hair.” “I’ve not ...

There was one of Mary Burke’s remarks upon which Hal soon got light⁠—her statement that North Valley was a place of fear. He listened to the tales of these underworld men, until it came so that he shu...

Hal was coming to know these people; to see them no longer as a mass, to be despised or pitied in bulk, but as individuals, with individual temperaments and problems, exactly like people in the world ...

Before long Hal had a chance to see this system of espionage at work, and he began to understand something of the force which kept these silent and patient armies at their tasks. On a Sunday morning h...

On the evening of the same Sunday Hal went to pay his promised call upon Mary Burke. She opened the front door of the cabin to let him in, and even by the dim rays of the little kerosene lamp, there c...

But then, as they were on their way home, tragedy fell upon them. Hearing a step behind them, Mary turned and looked; then catching Hal by the arm, she drew him into the shadows at the side, whisperin...

For the most part the victims of this system were cowed and spoke of their wrongs only in whispers; but there was one place in the camp, Hal found, where they could not keep silence, where their sense...

Old Mike boarded at Reminitsky’s, and after supper was over, Hal sought him out. He was easy to know, and proved an interesting acquaintance. With the help of his eloquence Hal wandered through a scor...

There was another way, Old Mike explained, in which the miner was at the mercy of others; this was the matter of stealing cars. Each miner had brass checks with his number on them, and when he sent up...

Such conditions made the coal-district a place of despair. Yet there were men who managed to get along somehow, and to raise families and keep decent homes. If one had the luck to escape accident, if ...

Hal made the move at once, sacrificing part of a month’s board, which Reminitsky would charge against his account with the company. But he was willing to pay for the privilege of a clean home and clea...

They strolled down the street, and Hal remarked, “That’s the first word I’ve heard here about a union.” Mary looked about her nervously. “Hush!” she whispered. “But I thought you said you were talking...

Mary Burke had said that the company could stand breaking the bones of its men; and not long after Number Two started up again, Hal had a chance to note the truth of this assertion. A miner’s life dep...

Hal was glad of this opportunity to get better acquainted with his pit-boss. Alec Stone was six feet high, and built in proportion, with arms like hams⁠—soft with fat, yet possessed of enormous streng...

Hal told himself with satisfaction that he was now to do the real work of coal-mining. His imagination had been occupied with it for a long time; but as so often happens in the life of man, the first ...

During these days of torment, Hal did not go to see “Red Mary”; but then, one evening, the Minettis’ baby having been sick, she came in to ask about it, bringing what she called “a bit of a custard” i...

The time came for Mary to take her departure, and Hal got up, wincing with pain, to escort her home. She regarded him gravely, having not realised before how seriously he was suffering. As they walked...

Hal had promised Alec Stone to keep a lookout for troublemakers; and one evening the boss stopped him on the street, and asked him if he had anything to report. Hal took the occasion to indulge his se...

Hal kept his eye upon his new acquaintance, and perceived that he was talking with others. Before long the man tackled Old Mike; and Mike of course could not refuse an invitation to grumble, though it...

Hal was so startled by this discovery that he stopped in his tracks and gazed at the man. He had heard a lot about “troublemakers” in the camps, but so far the only kind he had seen were those hired b...

They had come to a remote place in the canyon, and found themselves seats on a flat rock, where they could talk in comfort. “Put yourself in their place,” said the organiser. “They’re in a strange cou...

Olson was eager to win Hal, and went on to tell all the secrets of his work. He sought men who believed in unions, and were willing to take the risk of trying to convert others. In each place he visit...

Hal was now started upon a new career, more full of excitements than that of stableman or buddy, with perils greater than those of falling rock or the hind feet of mules in the stomach. The inertia wh...

Hal was now started upon a new career, more full of excitements than that of stableman or buddy, with perils greater than those of falling rock or the hind feet of mules in the stomach. The inertia wh...

Hal went back to Reminitsky’s boardinghouse; a heavy sacrifice, but not without its compensations, because it gave him more chance to talk with the men. He and Jerry made up a list of those who could ...

Mary Burke had been suckled upon despair, and the poison of it was deep in her blood. Hal began to realise that it would be as hard to give her a hope as to rouse the workers whom she despised. She wa...

The talk went on. Wishing to draw the old man out, Hal spoke of various troubles of the miners, and at last he suggested that the remedy might be found in a union. Edstrom’s dark eyes studied him, and...

This business of conspiracy was grimly real to men whose living came out of coal; but Hal, even at the most serious moments, continued to find in it the thrill of romance. He had read stories of revol...

The first thing Hal did was to seek out Tom Olson and narrate this experience. The two of them had a merry time over it. “I’m the favourite of a boss now!” laughed Hal. But the organiser became sudden...

Hal did not look back, but turned into the company-store. “North Valley Trading Company” read the sign over the door; within was a Serbian woman pointing out what she wanted to buy, and two little Lit...

Two days after this beginning of Hal’s political career, it was arranged that the workers who were to make a demand for a check-weighman should meet in the home of Mrs. David. When Mike Sikoria came u...

Having settled the matter of the committee, Hal told the assembly how Alec Stone had asked him to spy upon the men. He thought they should know about it; the bosses might try to use it against him, as...

Hal slept but little that night. Amid the sounds of the snoring of eight of Reminitsky’s other boarders, he lay going over in his mind various things which might happen on the morrow. Some of them wer...

At the meeting on the night before it had been agreed to spread the news of the check-weighman movement, for the sake of its propaganda value. So now when the three men came out from the office, there...

In the middle of the morning a man came up to him⁠—“Bud” Adams, a younger brother of the “J.P.,” and Jeff Cotton’s assistant. Bud was stocky, red-faced, and reputed to be handy with his fists. So Hal ...

When the quitting-whistle blew, Mike Sikoria came quickly to join Hal and hear what had happened. Mike was exultant, for several new men had come up to him and offered to join the check-weighman movem...

Old Mike went to sleep quickly; but Hal had not worked for several days, and had exciting thoughts to keep him awake. He had been lying quiet for a couple of hours, when he became aware that someone w...

Would they wait until morning, or would they come soon? He was inclined to the latter guess, so he was only slightly startled when, an hour or two later, he heard the knob of the cabin-door turned. A ...

It had been a crude and stupid plot, yet Hal realised that it was adapted to the intelligence of the men for whom it was intended. But for the accident that he had stayed awake, they would have found ...

Toward the middle of the morning, Hal heard footsteps in the corridor outside, and a man whom he did not know opened the barred door and set down a pitcher of water and a tin plate with a hunk of brea...

Morning came, and the mine-whistle blew, and Hal stood at the window again. This time he noticed that some of the miners on their way to work had little strips of paper in their hands, which strips th...

Hal took a minute or so to ponder the situation. “Mr. Cotton,” he said, at last. “I know how to spell better than that. Also my handwriting is a bit more fluent.” There was a trace of a smile about th...

When this conversation was continued, it was upon a new and unexpected line. “Cotton,” remarked the prisoner, “I perceive that you are a man of education. It occurs to me that once upon a time you mus...

The marshal went out, and a few moments later the jailer came back, with a meal which presented a surprising contrast to the ones he had previously served. There was a tray containing cold ham, a coup...

He took a turn about the room, then he came and stopped in front of Hal. He stood with his hands thrust into his pockets, with a certain jaunty grace that was out of keeping with his occupation. He wa...

Jeff Cotton sprang forward. “Stop!” he cried. But Hal did not stop. “See here, young man!” cried the marshal. “Don’t carry this joke too far!” And he sprang to the door, just ahead of his prisoner. Hi...

The camp-marshal of North Valley had been “agitated” to such an extent that he could not stay in his chair. All the harassments of his troubled career had come pouring into his mind. He had begun paci...

These were the last words Hal spoke. They were obvious enough words, yet when he looked back upon the coincidence, it seemed to him a singular one. For while he was sitting there chatting, it happened...

At moments in the midst of this confusion, Hal found himself trying to recall who had worked in Number One, among the people he knew. He himself had been employed in Number Two, so he had naturally co...

In the course of the afternoon Hal came upon Mary Burke on the street. She had long ago found her father, and seen him off to O’Callahan’s to celebrate the favours of Providence. Now Mary was concerne...

They came to Mary’s home; and next door was the home of the Slav woman, Mrs. Zamboni, about whom in the past she had told him so many funny stories. Mrs. Zamboni had had a new baby every year for sixt...

Mary made Hal swear that he would not get into a fight with Cotton; then they went to Number Two. They found the mules coming up, and the bosses promising that in a short while the men would be coming...

There followed a night and then another day of torturing suspense. The fan came, but it had to be set up before anything could be done. As volumes of black smoke continued to pour from the shaft, the ...

Mary forced herself to go on. “This is how I’ve worked it out, Joe! I said to meself, ‘Ye love this man; and it’s his love ye want⁠—nothin’ else! If he’s got a place in the world, ye’d only hold him b...

The two of them went back to the pit-mouth. It had been two days since the disaster, and still the fan had not been started, and there was no sign of its being started. The hysteria of the women was g...

As it happened, however, discussion of this list and the method of giving it to the world was cut short by a more urgent matter. Jack David came in with news of fresh trouble at the pit-mouth. The new...

In the course of his wanderings about the camp, Hal had observed several wide-awake looking young men with notebooks in their hands. He could see that these young men were being made guests of the com...

It was Hal’s intention to get to Western City as quickly as possible to call upon the newspaper editors. But first he must have money to travel, and the best way he could think of to get it was to fin...

It was Hal’s intention to get to Western City as quickly as possible to call upon the newspaper editors. But first he must have money to travel, and the best way he could think of to get it was to fin...

Keating went to the telephone again, to worry “long distance”; then, grumbling about his last edition, he came back to ask more questions about Hal’s experiences. Before long he drew out the story of ...

When Hal spoke, he did not answer Billy Keating’s last remark. He had been listening to a retelling of the North Valley disaster over the telephone; so he was not thinking about his skin, but about a ...

Mr. Richard Parker was busy, said the clerk in toe outer office; for which Hal was not sorry, as it gave him a chance to get his breath. Seeing a young man flushed and panting, the clerk stared with c...

Hal went down the street to the American Hotel, where there was a public stenographer. When this young woman discovered the nature of the material he proposed to dictate, her fingers trembled visibly;...

The district court was in session and Hal sat for a while in the courtroom, watching Judge Denton. Here was another prosperous and well-fed appearing gentleman, with a rubicund visage shining over the...

Hal stood and watched the portly figure until it disappeared; then he turned back and passed the three detectives, who stopped. He stared at them, but made no sign, nor did they. Some twenty feet behi...

Hal judged that he had now exhausted his legal resources in Pedro; the Chief of Police had not suggested anyone else he might call upon, so there seemed nothing he could do but go back to MacKellar’s ...

Billy Keating went out again, saying that he knew a man who might be willing to talk to him on the quiet, and give him some idea what was going to happen to Hal. Meantime Hal and Edstrom sat down to d...

Hal went on to question Keating about the apple-blossom girl. “Maybe I could guess who she is. What colour was her hair?” “The colour of molasses taffy when you’ve pulled it,” said Billy; “but all flu...

They had been sitting upstairs in MacKellar’s room. Now they rose, and were starting for the stairs, when suddenly there came a ring at the front door bell. They stopped and stared at one another. “Th...

White linen and cut glass of the dining-saloon shone brilliantly under electric lights, softened to the eye by pink shades. Seated at the tables were half a dozen young men and as many young ladies, a...

Knowing these people well, Hal could measure the effect of the thunderbolt he had hurled among them. They were people to whom good taste was the first of all the virtues; he knew how he was offending ...

There was a painful pause. Hal’s gaze travelled on, and came to a grey-haired lady in a black dinner-gown, with a rope of pearls about her neck. “Mrs. Curtis! Surely you will advise him!” The grey-hai...

Percy Harrigan was known to Hal, as a college-boy is known to his classmates. He was not brutal, like his grim old father; he was merely self-indulgent, as one who had always had everything; he was we...

Hal never knew what Percy said to Cartwright that night; he only knew that when they arrived at the mine the superintendent was summoned to a consultation, and half an hour later Percy emerged smiling...

Towards dawn Hal fell asleep; he was awakened by Billy Keating, who sat up yawning, at the same time grumbling and bewailing. Hal realised that Billy also had discovered troubles during the night. Nev...

Looking about, Hal saw some of the guests of the Harrigan party. There was Vivie Cass, standing under an umbrella with Bert Atkins; and there was Bob Creston with Dicky Everson. These two had on macki...

After allowing a sufficient time for the party in the dining-car to finish breakfast, Hal went down to the tracks, and induced the porter to take in his name to Percy Harrigan. He was hoping to persua...

Percy wanted Hal to come away with the party. He suggested this tactfully at first, and then, as Hal did not take the hint, he began to press the matter, showing signs of irritation. The mine was open...

Hal went into the drawing-room car. There were Mrs. Curtis and Reggie Porter, playing bridge with Genevieve Halsey and young Everson. Bob Creston was chatting with Betty Gunnison, telling her what he ...

Hal was still possessed by his idea that Jessie must be taught⁠—she must have knowledge forced upon her, whether she would or no. The train would not start for a couple of hours, and he tried to think...

So the time passed in a way that was pleasant. Jessie was completely won by this little Dago mine-urchin, in spite of all his frightful curse-words; and Hal saw that she was won, and was delighted by ...

Hal stood for a few moments in thought. He was surprised that such things should be happening while Percy Harrigan’s train was in the village. He was considering whether he should go to Percy, or whet...

It was the surging up in Jessie Arthur of that instinctive self, the creature of hereditary cruelty, of the existence of which Hal had no idea. She drew back, and there was a quiet hauteur in her tone...

The pit of death was giving up its secrets. The hoist was busy, and cage-load after cage-load came up, with bodies dead and bodies living and bodies only to be classified after machines had pumped air...

The pit of death was giving up its secrets. The hoist was busy, and cage-load after cage-load came up, with bodies dead and bodies living and bodies only to be classified after machines had pumped air...

Hal went out on the street again. It was the hour which would have been sunset in a level region; the tops of the mountains were touched with a purple light, and the air was fresh and chill with early...

The crowd moved down the street, shouting and cursing as it went. Someone started to sing the “Marseillaise,” and others took it up, and the words mounted to a frenzy: “To arms! To arms, ye brave! Mar...

This programme was a convenient one for Hal; but as he was to find almost at once, it had been adopted too late. He and Jerry started after the crowd, which had stopped in front of one of the company ...

Mary’s speech was brought to a sudden end. A group of the men had moved down the street, and there arose a disturbance there. The noise of it swelled louder, and more people began to move in that dire...

How long could a man expect to stand on the steps of a company building, with a super and a pit-boss at his back, and organise a union of mineworkers? Hal realised that he must move the crowd from tha...

They got to the place appointed without any fighting. And meantime Hal had worked out in his mind a plan for communicating with this polyglot horde. He knew that half the men could not understand a wo...

The committee and its bodyguard repaired to the dining-room of Reminitsky’s, where they stretched themselves out on the floor; no one attempted to interfere with them, and while the majority snored pe...

Hal read the document which had been prepared the night before. They demanded the right to have a union without being discharged for it. They demanded a check-weighman, to be elected by the men themse...

So Hal hurried off, and climbed the street which led to the superintendent’s house, a concrete bungalow set upon a little elevation overlooking the camp. He rang the bell, and the door opened, and in ...

But Edward would not stop for a single smile; his every faculty was absorbed in the task he had before him, to get his brother out of this predicament, so dangerous and so humiliating. Hal had come to...

Hal sat staring in front of him, silent. Was it a fact that every man had something in his life which palsied his arm, and struck him helpless in the battle for social justice? When he spoke again, it...

Coming to the main street of the village, Hal saw the crowd in front of the office. One glance told him that something had happened. Men were running this way and that, gesticulating, shouting. Some w...

Hal raised his arms as a signal for silence. “Boys,” he cried, “they’ve kidnapped our committee. They think they’ll break our strike that way⁠—but they’ll find they’ve made a mistake!” “They will! Rig...

Hal descended from his rostrum, and the crowds made way for him, and with his brother at his side he went down the street to the office building, upon the porch of which the guards were standing. His ...

Edward turned upon his brother. “Now what the devil did you want to put me through a scene like that for? So undignified! So utterly uncalled for! A quarrel with a man so far beneath you!” Hal stood w...

They went out by the rear door of the office, entered the car, and sped out of the village, unseen by the crowd. And all the way down the canyon Edward pleaded with Hal to drop the controversy and com...

Hal found Jerry Minetti with the two officials in their hotel-room: Jim Moylan, district secretary, a long, towering Irish boy, black-eyed and black-haired, quick and sensitive, the sort of person one...

Hal found himself forced to accept the decision of the labour-leaders. They had had experience, they could judge the situation. The miners would have to go back to work, and Cartwright and Alec Stone ...

Soon after dinner the kidnapped committee arrived, bedraggled in body and weary in soul. They inquired for Johann Hartman, and were sent up to the room, where there followed a painful scene. Eight men...

There was one member of this committee whom Hal watched with especial anxiety⁠—Mary Burke. She had not yet said a word; while the others argued and protested, she sat with her lips set and her hands c...

Hal proposed going to find Mrs. Zamboni at the place where she was staying; but Moylan interposed, objecting that the detectives would surely follow him. Even though they should all go out of the hote...

Bidding Mrs. Swajka farewell, Hal set out for the railroad station. But before he had gone a block from the hotel, he ran into his brother, coming straight towards him. Edward’s face wore a bored look...

The train up to North Valley left very soon, and Hal figured that there would be just time to accomplish his errand and catch the last train back. He took his seat in the car without attracting attent...

Hal took off his widow’s weeds; and with them he shed the merriment he had worn for the benefit of the men. There came a sudden reaction; he realised that he was tired. For ten days he had lived in a ...

Edward would have endeavoured to carry his brother away forthwith, but there was no train until late at night; so Hal went upstairs, where he found Moylan and Hartman with Mary Burke and Mrs. Zamboni,...

Hal wanted a chance to talk to Mary Burke; they had had no intimate talk since the meeting with Jessie Arthur, and now he was going away, for a long time. He wanted to find out what plans Mary had for...

Mary’s voice had dropped low, and Hal thought how rich and warm it was when she was deeply moved. She went on: “I lived all me life in minin’ camps, Joe Smith, and I seen men robbed and beaten, and wo...

They came to the house where John Edstrom was staying. The labouring man’s wife opened the door. In answer to Hal’s question, she said, “The old gentleman’s pretty bad.” “What’s the matter with him?” ...

In the end, of course, Hal had to come down to practical matters. He sat by the bed and told the old man tactfully that his brother had come to see him and had given him some money. This brother had p...

He went out to the street, where his brother was pacing up and down in a ferment. The “hardware drummer” had made another effort to start a conversation, and had been told to go to hell⁠—no less! “Wel...

From previous experiences the writer has learned that many people, reading a novel such as King Coal, desire to be informed as to whether it is true to fact. They write to ask if the book is meant to ...