Chapter 95 Massacre
The rabbi family sat in the open-air car at the end of a coal train. The coal beneath them stained the little sister's fingers black. She seemed happy, raised her dirty hands, and tried to touch her mother's face - but the woman's face was already covered with a layer of dust and fatigue.
The father, who had always been stingy, gave the train workers two silver coins, and they agreed to help them avoid the sheriff's sight and secretly give the whole family a ride in the coal car.
This was Jack's first time riding a train. With the roar of the steam engine starting up, he could feel everything around him clanking. His little sister started crying, and he quickly covered her ears. Soon, the low towns were swaying away from them. This train would cross the entire Black Lake County and head to the sea, passing through the Kasa Strait, the destination of the Rabbi family.
When the train really started running, Jack cleverly sneaked into the boiler room. He hid aside and watched for a while, then went to help the firemen shovel coal into the boiler. Then they began to talk to him happily, and one of them even gave him half of his lunch.
"My kid is about your age." The stoker, who had shared his lunch with Jack when he heard he was studying at a church school, exclaimed enviously, "When I save up some more money, I'll send my kid to school, too. It would be best if he could go to town and not stay in the mines anymore."
"This is really not a place for people to stay," he said, shaking his head. "My kid told me last time that they actually lit a fire downstairs to prevent the child workers from being lazy when sweeping the chimney!"
"Stop dreaming," the other man spat on the ground and sneered, "You can't even get enough to eat, and you still want to study?"
"Hey, kid, can you read?" After getting an affirmative answer, he handed Jack a newspaper and raised his chin at him: "Siyan didn't come to work today, can you read it for us? What's written in this newspaper?"
Jack looked closely and couldn't help but stare wide-eyed. The other party was still urging him on, and the idle workers around him gathered around. He couldn't help but rub his dirty hands on his pants, then carefully unfolded the newspaper, cleared his throat and began to read.
"...Aren't these coal miners working hard enough? Aren't they fighting tooth and nail just to survive? Take Black County, for example. Last year, the average monthly wage for an adult male worker was 120 copper coins, while female workers earned 58 copper coins, and child workers earned only 25 copper coins. And for a normal family of three to stay well fed and clothed in the winter, they'd need to spend at least 70 copper coins a month on coal and firewood, 65 copper coins on staples like bread, flour, oatmeal, and potatoes, and 61 copper coins on side dishes like salt, sugar, butter, cheese, vegetables, and bacon."
"In other words, a family must have everyone, including children, working hard to barely survive - this is assuming there is no illness, no entertainment, no education, no new clothes and snacks for children, and that prices remain stable."
...No wonder they were willing to take the risk to give them a ride. Jack couldn't help but secretly think that 2 silver coins were equivalent to 100 copper coins. Even if these train workers divided it equally, it would still be a considerable amount of extra income.
"Nonsense! Our union has said that this month's salary cannot be that much, only 95 copper coins!" A worker couldn't help but curse in a hoarse voice.
Someone slapped him on the back of the head. "You got donkey hair in your ears? Mr. Nova said it was last year!"
Someone immediately tugged at his hand, and the man, as if realizing he'd said something wrong, quickly shut up. But Jack was completely oblivious to this little incident. As he read, his eyes began to warm, and his voice grew increasingly passionate: "If hard work could bring wealth, then the richest mine owners in the world would be miners with dark lungs and twisted spines, the great plantation owners would be child laborers on tobacco plantations who never reached adulthood, and the great wool merchants would be textile workers who work day and night, their fingers bleeding—what exactly caused all this injustice?"
The child's voice split, but no one laughed at him.
"That's because this world has a system where people exploit and oppress each other. The happiness of a tiny minority is built on the suffering of the vast majority. This unreasonable phenomenon shouldn't exist. We should wave our fists and resist—"
"Alright!" The worker who had just asked him to read the newspaper suddenly snatched the newspaper from Jack's hand rudely and pushed him out of the boiler room: "Stop making trouble here, you little brat! Get out of here!"
Jack was confused, and suddenly he heard the man whisper in his ear: "Tell your father, no matter what noise you hear tonight, hide in the coal pile and don't make a sound, understand?"
The train would stop overnight for maintenance in the Rust Belt, near the largest mining area nearby. Blacksmith Rabbi's face darkened when he heard his son's message—clearly, the workers were planning something, and they had just happened to be caught in the act. The train operator had plotted against their family, but now they couldn't leave. The surrounding area was filled with endless mines. Where could they go after leaving the train?
Jack wrapped his robe tightly around him, his little sister already asleep in his arms. Because the train car was too cramped, his parents were in another, buried in a layer of coal, leaving just enough room for breathing. Through the gaps in the slats, Jack saw the moonlight illuminating the mines, casting an iron-like silver-gray hue. Armed sheriffs patrolled the area—and then Jack heard a loud bang, and a dazzling, scorching flame erupted from the nearby tracks.
Someone had blown up the train tracks. Jack covered his little sister's mouth, her mouth trembling with fear, his eyes fixed on the empty space—he clearly saw, taking advantage of the night, a dozen dark figures emerge from the shadows of the train, quickly knocking several panicked sheriffs to the ground and tying them up with ropes. More people emerged, perhaps a hundred or so, their skin gleaming dark in the moonlight. They were all coal miners from the nearby area.
The leader was the stoker who had made him read the newspaper during the day and told him to keep quiet.
"I say again, we are on a fucking strike, gentlemen." The man sneered and stood in front of the sheriff, hitting them in the face with the butt of his rifle.
"We're not slaves who were sold here, and our demands aren't high. We just want our wages adjusted back to last year's level, and for supervisors to stop beating our workers. Our union has been wrangling with you for half a year, but you high-handed gentlemen won't agree. The weather's getting colder, and our wives and children at home are starving. Why should we toil so hard for you?"
In recent years, the empire's economic situation has become increasingly severe. To save labor costs, the major mine owners have continued to lower the already low wages of the coal miners in Black County. Especially since the promulgation of the new energy tax law, wages have dropped to an unbelievable level.
The Black County coal miners, starved of food and clothing and often subjected to beatings and verbal abuse from supervisors, had finally lost their patience. Led by the coal miners' union, calls for resistance and strikes erupted this month in a concentrated and massive manner.
They targeted coal mining, and workers in various positions, including mining, operation, and transportation, began an organized strike. Those who attempted to surrender were secretly executed, and even resorted to sabotage of mining equipment. It was only because the royal family suppressed this information that these rumors, which could have disrupted the market and public sentiment, did not spread.
The leading worker turned his neck, and then heard the same explosions coming from the mine area, and the smile on his face deepened.
"The train tracks have been blown up, and the machines in the mine are useless." He shook his head at the shocked sheriff: "Don't worry, we won't kill anyone. We just want justice. As long as you-"
The expression on his face suddenly froze, and Jack almost screamed - a bolt of light pierced the leader's chest, and the muscles on that ordinary, forgettable face twitched. He seemed to want to say something, but in the end he fell down silently.
Blood gushed out of the coal miners' chests, staining the barren and dry soil of the mining area red.
Amidst the crowd's horrified and angry gazes, a knight on horseback wearing a silver helmet appeared on the horizon, followed by about three hundred men in military uniforms—they were the regular army of the Silver Iris Empire.
The Knight in Silver Helmet did not dismount. He unfolded a scroll, which was an edict from Her Majesty the Queen. The full text was only sixty-one words, and the content was very simple - it was announced that those who went on strike and obstructed coal mining were rebellious mobs, and the army was ordered to execute them all.
"Due to Her Majesty the Queen's mercy, I will give you five minutes to leave the train, and the damage you have caused will be forgiven." said the Knight of the Silver Helmet.
No one left, and countless hands tried to lift the body lying on the ground.
About five minutes later, the Silver Helmet Knight took out his pocket watch, glanced at it, and shrugged. "Well, what a shame."
The troops behind him raised their guns at the hundred ragged miners in front of them.
"Shoot." said the Knight in Silver Helmet.
Jack didn't know what happened next. He fainted. When he regained consciousness, the sunlight that shot through the gaps between the slats of the carriage hurt his eyes.
With his little sister fast asleep in his arms and the train miraculously continuing to rattle on, Jack began to think that everything he had seen at night was just a nightmare—until he tried to get out and felt an arm as cold and stiff as plaster. Through a few pieces of coal, the corpse's bloodshot eyes stared back at him.
Jack recognized the face—the stoker with whom he had shared half his lunch.
He finally climbed out, crawling from one car to another - the bodies of the miners who died in the massacre were probably all on this coal train, neatly arranged in rows, ready to be thrown into the sea like discarded coal slag.
But even after the train stopped at the Kasa Strait and Jack escaped the nightmarish beast with his little sister in his arms, he still couldn't find the carriage his parents were in. Perhaps they had been discovered, dead, or perhaps he just couldn't find them—a sudden downpour fell over the Kasa Strait. Jack reluctantly followed the path he remembered to the meeting place with his second brother, but collapsed the moment he entered.
In the midst of a high fever, he heard himself wailing: "They are all dead, all those coal miners are dead!"
The author has something to say:
Description of the Coal Miners' Massacre and its Inspiration: A Tribute to the United Fruit Company Massacre in One Hundred Years of Solitude
The reference for pricing the living expenses of coal miners is below. Thanks to my excellent history consultant, my fortune teller friend with a master's degree in history, it should be more reasonable. The monthly salary of a professor at the school is 300 copper coins, and some of his own royalties support his hobby expenses (the bulk of his expenses). However, if you compare the monthly salary of university professors in the Republic of China (200-300) with the monthly salary of workers (15)... I can't help but feel guilty, so I didn't set it too high.
References:
[1] Qian Jiaxian, “An Economic Perspective on the Living Standards of Workers in the British Industrial Revolution”, Journal of Qujing Normal University, No. 1, 2003
[2]Xu Bin, “Changes in Workers’ Living Standards during the British Industrial Revolution”, Economic and Social History Review, 2014, no.
[3] Zhu Jiajun: On the Coal Industry in Britain during the Industrial Revolution, Master’s thesis, Hunan University of Science and Technology, 2015
[4] Ma Tao, “Research on the Development of the British Coal Industry and Its Relationship with the Industrial Revolution”, PhD dissertation, Tianjin Normal University, 2014
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