"Rudkus--Jurgis Rudkus."

"My fren', Mr. Rednose, Hamilton--shake han's."

The stately butler bowed his head, but made not a sound; and suddenly
Master Freddie pointed an eager finger at him. "I know whuzzamatter wiz
you, Hamilton--lay you a dollar I know! You think--hic--you think I'm
drunk! Hey, now?"

And the butler again bowed his head. "Yes, sir," he said, at which
Master Freddie hung tightly upon Jurgis's neck and went into a fit of
laughter. "Hamilton, you damn ole scoundrel," he roared, "I'll 'scharge
you for impudence, you see 'f I don't! Ho, ho, ho! I'm drunk! Ho, ho!"

The two waited until his fit had spent itself, to see what new whim
would seize him. "Whatcha wanta do?" he queried suddenly. "Wanta see
the place, ole chappie? Wamme play the guv'ner--show you roun'? State
parlors--Looee Cans--Looee Sez--chairs cost three thousand apiece. Tea
room Maryanntnet--picture of shepherds dancing--Ruysdael--twenty-three
thousan'! Ballroom--balc'ny pillars--hic--imported--special
ship--sixty-eight thousan'! Ceilin' painted in Rome--whuzzat
feller's name, Hamilton--Mattatoni? Macaroni? Then this place--silver
bowl--Benvenuto Cellini--rummy ole Dago! An' the organ--thirty thousan'
dollars, sir--starter up, Hamilton, let Mr. Rednose hear it. No--never
mind--clean forgot--says he's hungry, Hamilton--less have some supper.
Only--hic--don't less have it here--come up to my place, ole sport--nice
an' cosy. This way--steady now, don't slip on the floor. Hamilton, we'll
have a cole spread, an' some fizz--don't leave out the fizz, by Harry.
We'll have some of the eighteen-thirty Madeira. Hear me, sir?"

"Yes, sir," said the butler, "but, Master Frederick, your father left
orders--"

And Master Frederick drew himself up to a stately height. "My father's
orders were left to me--hic--an' not to you," he said. Then, clasping
Jurgis tightly by the neck, he staggered out of the room; on the way
another idea occurred to him, and he asked: "Any--hic--cable message for
me, Hamilton?"

"No, sir," said the butler.

"Guv'ner must be travelin'. An' how's the twins, Hamilton?"

"They are doing well, sir."

"Good!" said Master Freddie; and added fervently: "God bless 'em, the
little lambs!"

They went up the great staircase, one step at a time; at the top of it
there gleamed at them out of the shadows the figure of a nymph crouching
by a fountain, a figure ravishingly beautiful, the flesh warm and
glowing with the hues of life. Above was a huge court, with domed roof,
the various apartments opening into it. The butler had paused below but
a few minutes to give orders, and then followed them; now he pressed a
button, and the hall blazed with light. He opened a door before them,
and then pressed another button, as they staggered into the apartment.

It was fitted up as a study. In the center was a mahogany table, covered
with books, and smokers' implements; the walls were decorated
with college trophies and colors--flags, posters, photographs and
knickknacks--tennis rackets, canoe paddles, golf clubs, and polo sticks.
An enormous moose head, with horns six feet across, faced a buffalo head
on the opposite wall, while bear and tiger skins covered the polished
floor. There were lounging chairs and sofas, window seats covered with
soft cushions of fantastic designs; there was one corner fitted in
Persian fashion, with a huge canopy and a jeweled lamp beneath. Beyond,
a door opened upon a bedroom, and beyond that was a swimming pool of the
purest marble, that had cost about forty thousand dollars.

Master Freddie stood for a moment or two, gazing about him; then out
of the next room a dog emerged, a monstrous bulldog, the most hideous
object that Jurgis had ever laid eyes upon. He yawned, opening a mouth
like a dragon's; and he came toward the young man, wagging his tail.
"Hello, Dewey!" cried his master. "Been havin' a snooze, ole boy? Well,
well--hello there, whuzzamatter?" (The dog was snarling at Jurgis.)
"Why, Dewey--this' my fren', Mr. Rednose--ole fren' the guv'ner's! Mr.
Rednose, Admiral Dewey; shake han's--hic. Ain't he a daisy, though--blue
ribbon at the New York show--eighty-five hundred at a clip! How's that,
hey?"

The speaker sank into one of the big armchairs, and Admiral Dewey
crouched beneath it; he did not snarl again, but he never took his eyes
off Jurgis. He was perfectly sober, was the Admiral.

The butler had closed the door, and he stood by it, watching Jurgis
every second. Now there came footsteps outside, and, as he opened the
door a man in livery entered, carrying a folding table, and behind him
two men with covered trays. They stood like statues while the first
spread the table and set out the contents of the trays upon it.
There were cold pates, and thin slices of meat, tiny bread and butter
sandwiches with the crust cut off, a bowl of sliced peaches and cream
(in January), little fancy cakes, pink and green and yellow and white,
and half a dozen ice-cold bottles of wine.

"Thass the stuff for you!" cried Master Freddie, exultantly, as he spied
them. "Come 'long, ole chappie, move up."

And he seated himself at the table; the waiter pulled a cork, and he
took the bottle and poured three glasses of its contents in succession
down his throat. Then he gave a long-drawn sigh, and cried again to
Jurgis to seat himself.

The butler held the chair at the opposite side of the table, and Jurgis
thought it was to keep him out of it; but finally he understand that
it was the other's intention to put it under him, and so he sat
down, cautiously and mistrustingly. Master Freddie perceived that the
attendants embarrassed him, and he remarked with a nod to them, "You may
go."

They went, all save the butler.

"You may go too, Hamilton," he said.

"Master Frederick--" the man began.

"Go!" cried the youngster, angrily. "Damn you, don't you hear me?"

The man went out and closed the door; Jurgis, who was as sharp as he,
observed that he took the key out of the lock, in order that he might
peer through the keyhole.

Master Frederick turned to the table again. "Now," he said, "go for it."

Jurgis gazed at him doubtingly. "Eat!" cried the other. "Pile in, ole
chappie!"

"Don't you want anything?" Jurgis asked.

"Ain't hungry," was the reply--"only thirsty. Kitty and me had some
candy--you go on."

So Jurgis began, without further parley. He ate as with two shovels, his
fork in one hand and his knife in the other; when he once got started
his wolf-hunger got the better of him, and he did not stop for breath
until he had cleared every plate. "Gee whiz!" said the other, who had
been watching him in wonder.

Then he held Jurgis the bottle. "Lessee you drink now," he said; and
Jurgis took the bottle and turned it up to his mouth, and a wonderfully
unearthly liquid ecstasy poured down his throat, tickling every nerve of
him, thrilling him with joy. He drank the very last drop of it, and then
he gave vent to a long-drawn "Ah!"

"Good stuff, hey?" said Freddie, sympathetically; he had leaned back in
the big chair, putting his arm behind his head and gazing at Jurgis.

And Jurgis gazed back at him. He was clad in spotless evening dress, was
Freddie, and looked very handsome--he was a beautiful boy, with
light golden hair and the head of an Antinous. He smiled at Jurgis
confidingly, and then started talking again, with his blissful
insouciance. This time he talked for ten minutes at a stretch, and in
the course of the speech he told Jurgis all of his family history. His
big brother Charlie was in love with the guileless maiden who played the
part of "Little Bright-Eyes" in "The Kaliph of Kamskatka." He had been
on the verge of marrying her once, only "the guv'ner" had sworn to
disinherit him, and had presented him with a sum that would stagger the
imagination, and that had staggered the virtue of "Little Bright-Eyes."
Now Charlie had got leave from college, and had gone away in his
automobile on the next best thing to a honeymoon. "The guv'ner" had made
threats to disinherit another of his children also, sister Gwendolen,
who had married an Italian marquis with a string of titles and a dueling
record. They lived in his chateau, or rather had, until he had taken to
firing the breakfast dishes at her; then she had cabled for help, and
the old gentleman had gone over to find out what were his Grace's terms.
So they had left Freddie all alone, and he with less than two thousand
dollars in his pocket. Freddie was up in arms and meant serious
business, as they would find in the end--if there was no other way of
bringing them to terms he would have his "Kittens" wire that she was
about to marry him, and see what happened then.

So the cheerful youngster rattled on, until he was tired out. He smiled
his sweetest smile at Jurgis, and then he closed his eyes, sleepily.
Then he opened them again, and smiled once more, and finally closed them
and forgot to open them.

For several minutes Jurgis sat perfectly motionless, watching him, and
reveling in the strange sensation of the champagne. Once he stirred,
and the dog growled; after that he sat almost holding his breath--until
after a while the door of the room opened softly, and the butler came
in.

He walked toward Jurgis upon tiptoe, scowling at him; and Jurgis rose
up, and retreated, scowling back. So until he was against the wall, and
then the butler came close, and pointed toward the door. "Get out of
here!" he whispered.

Jurgis hesitated, giving a glance at Freddie, who was snoring softly.
"If you do, you son of a--" hissed the butler, "I'll mash in your face
for you before you get out of here!"

And Jurgis wavered but an instant more. He saw "Admiral Dewey" coming
up behind the man and growling softly, to back up his threats. Then he
surrendered and started toward the door.

They went out without a sound, and down the great echoing staircase,
and through the dark hall. At the front door he paused, and the butler
strode close to him.

"Hold up your hands," he snarled. Jurgis took a step back, clinching his
one well fist.

"What for?" he cried; and then understanding that the fellow proposed to
search him, he answered, "I'll see you in hell first."

"Do you want to go to jail?" demanded the butler, menacingly. "I'll have
the police--"

"Have 'em!" roared Jurgis, with fierce passion. "But you won't put
your hands on me till you do! I haven't touched anything in your damned
house, and I'll not have you touch me!"

So the butler, who was terrified lest his young master should waken,
stepped suddenly to the door, and opened it. "Get out of here!" he said;
and then as Jurgis passed through the opening, he gave him a ferocious
kick that sent him down the great stone steps at a run, and landed him
sprawling in the snow at the bottom.



Chapter 25


Jurgis got up, wild with rage, but the door was shut and the great
castle was dark and impregnable. Then the icy teeth of the blast bit
into him, and he turned and went away at a run.

When he stopped again it was because he was coming to frequented
streets and did not wish to attract attention. In spite of that last
humiliation, his heart was thumping fast with triumph. He had come out
ahead on that deal! He put his hand into his trousers' pocket every now
and then, to make sure that the precious hundred-dollar bill was still
there.

Yet he was in a plight--a curious and even dreadful plight, when he came
to realize it. He had not a single cent but that one bill! And he had to
find some shelter that night he had to change it!

Jurgis spent half an hour walking and debating the problem. There was
no one he could go to for help--he had to manage it all alone. To get
it changed in a lodging-house would be to take his life in his hands--he
would almost certainly be robbed, and perhaps murdered, before morning.
He might go to some hotel or railroad depot and ask to have it changed;
but what would they think, seeing a "bum" like him with a hundred
dollars? He would probably be arrested if he tried it; and what story
could he tell? On the morrow Freddie Jones would discover his loss, and
there would be a hunt for him, and he would lose his money. The only
other plan he could think of was to try in a saloon. He might pay them
to change it, if it could not be done otherwise.

He began peering into places as he walked; he passed several as being
too crowded--then finally, chancing upon one where the bartender was all
alone, he gripped his hands in sudden resolution and went in.

"Can you change me a hundred-dollar bill?" he demanded.

The bartender was a big, husky fellow, with the jaw of a prize fighter,
and a three weeks' stubble of hair upon it. He stared at Jurgis. "What's
that youse say?" he demanded.

"I said, could you change me a hundred-dollar bill?"

"Where'd youse get it?" he inquired incredulously.

"Never mind," said Jurgis; "I've got it, and I want it changed. I'll pay
you if you'll do it."

The other stared at him hard. "Lemme see it," he said.

"Will you change it?" Jurgis demanded, gripping it tightly in his
pocket.

"How the hell can I know if it's good or not?" retorted the bartender.
"Whatcher take me for, hey?"

Then Jurgis slowly and warily approached him; he took out the bill, and
fumbled it for a moment, while the man stared at him with hostile eyes
across the counter. Then finally he handed it over.

The other took it, and began to examine it; he smoothed it between his
fingers, and held it up to the light; he turned it over, and upside
down, and edgeways. It was new and rather stiff, and that made him
dubious. Jurgis was watching him like a cat all the time.

"Humph," he said, finally, and gazed at the stranger, sizing him up--a
ragged, ill-smelling tramp, with no overcoat and one arm in a sling--and
a hundred-dollar bill! "Want to buy anything?" he demanded.

"Yes," said Jurgis, "I'll take a glass of beer."

"All right," said the other, "I'll change it." And he put the bill in
his pocket, and poured Jurgis out a glass of beer, and set it on the
counter. Then he turned to the cash register, and punched up five cents,
and began to pull money out of the drawer. Finally, he faced Jurgis,
counting it out--two dimes, a quarter, and fifty cents. "There," he
said.

For a second Jurgis waited, expecting to see him turn again. "My
ninety-nine dollars," he said.

"What ninety-nine dollars?" demanded the bartender.

"My change!" he cried--"the rest of my hundred!"

"Go on," said the bartender, "you're nutty!"

And Jurgis stared at him with wild eyes. For an instant horror reigned
in him--black, paralyzing, awful horror, clutching him at the heart;
and then came rage, in surging, blinding floods--he screamed aloud, and
seized the glass and hurled it at the other's head. The man ducked, and
it missed him by half an inch; he rose again and faced Jurgis, who was
vaulting over the bar with his one well arm, and dealt him a smashing
blow in the face, hurling him backward upon the floor. Then, as Jurgis
scrambled to his feet again and started round the counter after him, he
shouted at the top of his voice, "Help! help!"

Jurgis seized a bottle off the counter as he ran; and as the bartender
made a leap he hurled the missile at him with all his force. It just
grazed his head, and shivered into a thousand pieces against the post
of the door. Then Jurgis started back, rushing at the man again in the
middle of the room. This time, in his blind frenzy, he came without a
bottle, and that was all the bartender wanted--he met him halfway and
floored him with a sledgehammer drive between the eyes. An instant later
the screen doors flew open, and two men rushed in--just as Jurgis was
getting to his feet again, foaming at the mouth with rage, and trying to
tear his broken arm out of its bandages.

"Look out!" shouted the bartender. "He's got a knife!" Then, seeing that
the two were disposed to join the fray, he made another rush at Jurgis,
and knocked aside his feeble defense and sent him tumbling again; and
the three flung themselves upon him, rolling and kicking about the
place.

A second later a policeman dashed in, and the bartender yelled once
more--"Look out for his knife!" Jurgis had fought himself half to his
knees, when the policeman made a leap at him, and cracked him across the
face with his club. Though the blow staggered him, the wild-beast frenzy
still blazed in him, and he got to his feet, lunging into the air. Then
again the club descended, full upon his head, and he dropped like a log
to the floor.

The policeman crouched over him, clutching his stick, waiting for him to
try to rise again; and meantime the barkeeper got up, and put his hand
to his head. "Christ!" he said, "I thought I was done for that time. Did
he cut me?"

"Don't see anything, Jake," said the policeman. "What's the matter with
him?"

"Just crazy drunk," said the other. "A lame duck, too--but he 'most got
me under the bar. Youse had better call the wagon, Billy."

"No," said the officer. "He's got no more fight in him, I guess--and
he's only got a block to go." He twisted his hand in Jurgis's collar and
jerked at him. "Git up here, you!" he commanded.

But Jurgis did not move, and the bartender went behind the bar, and
after stowing the hundred-dollar bill away in a safe hiding place, came
and poured a glass of water over Jurgis. Then, as the latter began to
moan feebly, the policeman got him to his feet and dragged him out of
the place. The station house was just around the corner, and so in a few
minutes Jurgis was in a cell.

He spent half the night lying unconscious, and the balance moaning in
torment, with a blinding headache and a racking thirst. Now and then
he cried aloud for a drink of water, but there was no one to hear him.
There were others in that same station house with split heads and
a fever; there were hundreds of them in the great city, and tens of
thousands of them in the great land, and there was no one to hear any of
them.

In the morning Jurgis was given a cup of water and a piece of bread, and
then hustled into a patrol wagon and driven to the nearest police court.
He sat in the pen with a score of others until his turn came.

The bartender--who proved to be a well-known bruiser--was called to the
stand, He took the oath and told his story. The prisoner had come into
his saloon after midnight, fighting drunk, and had ordered a glass
of beer and tendered a dollar bill in payment. He had been given
ninety-five cents' change, and had demanded ninety-nine dollars more,
and before the plaintiff could even answer had hurled the glass at him
and then attacked him with a bottle of bitters, and nearly wrecked the
place.

Then the prisoner was sworn--a forlorn object, haggard and unshorn, with
an arm done up in a filthy bandage, a cheek and head cut, and bloody,
and one eye purplish black and entirely closed. "What have you to say
for yourself?" queried the magistrate.

"Your Honor," said Jurgis, "I went into his place and asked the man
if he could change me a hundred-dollar bill. And he said he would if
I bought a drink. I gave him the bill and then he wouldn't give me the
change."

The magistrate was staring at him in perplexity. "You gave him a
hundred-dollar bill!" he exclaimed.

"Yes, your Honor," said Jurgis.

"Where did you get it?"

"A man gave it to me, your Honor."

"A man? What man, and what for?"

"A young man I met upon the street, your Honor. I had been begging."

There was a titter in the courtroom; the officer who was holding Jurgis
put up his hand to hide a smile, and the magistrate smiled without
trying to hide it. "It's true, your Honor!" cried Jurgis, passionately.

"You had been drinking as well as begging last night, had you not?"
inquired the magistrate. "No, your Honor--" protested Jurgis. "I--"

"You had not had anything to drink?"

"Why, yes, your Honor, I had--"

"What did you have?"

"I had a bottle of something--I don't know what it was--something that
burned--"

There was again a laugh round the courtroom, stopping suddenly as the
magistrate looked up and frowned. "Have you ever been arrested before?"
he asked abruptly.

The question took Jurgis aback. "I--I--" he stammered.

"Tell me the truth, now!" commanded the other, sternly.

"Yes, your Honor," said Jurgis.

"How often?"

"Only once, your Honor."

"What for?"

"For knocking down my boss, your Honor. I was working in the stockyards,
and he--"

"I see," said his Honor; "I guess that will do. You ought to stop
drinking if you can't control yourself. Ten days and costs. Next case."

Jurgis gave vent to a cry of dismay, cut off suddenly by the policeman,
who seized him by the collar. He was jerked out of the way, into a room
with the convicted prisoners, where he sat and wept like a child in
his impotent rage. It seemed monstrous to him that policemen and
judges should esteem his word as nothing in comparison with the
bartender's--poor Jurgis could not know that the owner of the saloon
paid five dollars each week to the policeman alone for Sunday privileges
and general favors--nor that the pugilist bartender was one of the
most trusted henchmen of the Democratic leader of the district, and had
helped only a few months before to hustle out a record-breaking vote as
a testimonial to the magistrate, who had been made the target of odious
kid-gloved reformers.

Jurgis was driven out to the Bridewell for the second time. In his
tumbling around he had hurt his arm again, and so could not work, but
had to be attended by the physician. Also his head and his eye had to
be tied up--and so he was a pretty-looking object when, the second
day after his arrival, he went out into the exercise court and
encountered--Jack Duane!

The young fellow was so glad to see Jurgis that he almost hugged him.
"By God, if it isn't 'the Stinker'!" he cried. "And what is it--have you
been through a sausage machine?"

"No," said Jurgis, "but I've been in a railroad wreck and a fight." And
then, while some of the other prisoners gathered round he told his wild
story; most of them were incredulous, but Duane knew that Jurgis could
never have made up such a yarn as that.

"Hard luck, old man," he said, when they were alone; "but maybe it's
taught you a lesson."

"I've learned some things since I saw you last," said Jurgis mournfully.
Then he explained how he had spent the last summer, "hoboing it," as
the phrase was. "And you?" he asked finally. "Have you been here ever
since?"

"Lord, no!" said the other. "I only came in the day before yesterday.
It's the second time they've sent me up on a trumped-up charge--I've had
hard luck and can't pay them what they want. Why don't you quit Chicago
with me, Jurgis?"

"I've no place to go," said Jurgis, sadly.

"Neither have I," replied the other, laughing lightly. "But we'll wait
till we get out and see."

In the Bridewell Jurgis met few who had been there the last time, but
he met scores of others, old and young, of exactly the same sort. It
was like breakers upon a beach; there was new water, but the wave looked
just the same. He strolled about and talked with them, and the biggest
of them told tales of their prowess, while those who were weaker, or
younger and inexperienced, gathered round and listened in admiring
silence. The last time he was there, Jurgis had thought of little but
his family; but now he was free to listen to these men, and to realize
that he was one of them--that their point of view was his point of view,
and that the way they kept themselves alive in the world was the way he
meant to do it in the future.

And so, when he was turned out of prison again, without a penny in his
pocket, he went straight to Jack Duane. He went full of humility and
gratitude; for Duane was a gentleman, and a man with a profession--and
it was remarkable that he should be willing to throw in his lot with a
humble workingman, one who had even been a beggar and a tramp. Jurgis
could not see what help he could be to him; but he did not understand
that a man like himself--who could be trusted to stand by any one who
was kind to him--was as rare among criminals as among any other class of
men.

The address Jurgis had was a garret room in the Ghetto district, the
home of a pretty little French girl, Duane's mistress, who sewed all
day, and eked out her living by prostitution. He had gone elsewhere, she
told Jurgis--he was afraid to stay there now, on account of the police.
The new address was a cellar dive, whose proprietor said that he had
never heard of Duane; but after he had put Jurgis through a catechism
he showed him a back stairs which led to a "fence" in the rear of a
pawnbroker's shop, and thence to a number of assignation rooms, in one
of which Duane was hiding.

Duane was glad to see him; he was without a cent of money, he said,
and had been waiting for Jurgis to help him get some. He explained his
plan--in fact he spent the day in laying bare to his friend the criminal
world of the city, and in showing him how he might earn himself a living
in it. That winter he would have a hard time, on account of his arm, and
because of an unwonted fit of activity of the police; but so long as he
was unknown to them he would be safe if he were careful. Here at "Papa"
Hanson's (so they called the old man who kept the dive) he might rest at
ease, for "Papa" Hanson was "square"--would stand by him so long as he
paid, and gave him an hour's notice if there were to be a police raid.
Also Rosensteg, the pawnbroker, would buy anything he had for a third of
its value, and guarantee to keep it hidden for a year.

There was an oil stove in the little cupboard of a room, and they had
some supper; and then about eleven o'clock at night they sallied forth
together, by a rear entrance to the place, Duane armed with a slingshot.
They came to a residence district, and he sprang up a lamppost and blew
out the light, and then the two dodged into the shelter of an area step
and hid in silence.

Pretty soon a man came by, a workingman--and they let him go. Then after
a long interval came the heavy tread of a policeman, and they held their
breath till he was gone. Though half-frozen, they waited a full quarter
of an hour after that--and then again came footsteps, walking briskly.
Duane nudged Jurgis, and the instant the man had passed they rose up.
Duane stole out as silently as a shadow, and a second later Jurgis heard
a thud and a stifled cry. He was only a couple of feet behind, and he
leaped to stop the man's mouth, while Duane held him fast by the arms,
as they had agreed. But the man was limp and showed a tendency to fall,
and so Jurgis had only to hold him by the collar, while the other,
with swift fingers, went through his pockets--ripping open, first his
overcoat, and then his coat, and then his vest, searching inside and
outside, and transferring the contents into his own pockets. At last,
after feeling of the man's fingers and in his necktie, Duane whispered,
"That's all!" and they dragged him to the area and dropped him in. Then
Jurgis went one way and his friend the other, walking briskly.

The latter arrived first, and Jurgis found him examining the "swag."
There was a gold watch, for one thing, with a chain and locket; there
was a silver pencil, and a matchbox, and a handful of small change,
and finally a cardcase. This last Duane opened feverishly--there were
letters and checks, and two theater-tickets, and at last, in the back
part, a wad of bills. He counted them--there was a twenty, five tens,
four fives, and three ones. Duane drew a long breath. "That lets us
out!" he said.

After further examination, they burned the cardcase and its contents,
all but the bills, and likewise the picture of a little girl in the
locket. Then Duane took the watch and trinkets downstairs, and came back
with sixteen dollars. "The old scoundrel said the case was filled," he
said. "It's a lie, but he knows I want the money."

They divided up the spoils, and Jurgis got as his share fifty-five
dollars and some change. He protested that it was too much, but the
other had agreed to divide even. That was a good haul, he said, better
than average.

When they got up in the morning, Jurgis was sent out to buy a paper;
one of the pleasures of committing a crime was the reading about
it afterward. "I had a pal that always did it," Duane remarked,
laughing--"until one day he read that he had left three thousand dollars
in a lower inside pocket of his party's vest!"

There was a half-column account of the robbery--it was evident that a
gang was operating in the neighborhood, said the paper, for it was
the third within a week, and the police were apparently powerless. The
victim was an insurance agent, and he had lost a hundred and ten dollars
that did not belong to him. He had chanced to have his name marked
on his shirt, otherwise he would not have been identified yet. His
assailant had hit him too hard, and he was suffering from concussion of
the brain; and also he had been half-frozen when found, and would lose
three fingers on his right hand. The enterprising newspaper reporter had
taken all this information to his family, and told how they had received
it.

Since it was Jurgis's first experience, these details naturally caused
him some worriment; but the other laughed coolly--it was the way of the
game, and there was no helping it. Before long Jurgis would think no
more of it than they did in the yards of knocking out a bullock. "It's a
case of us or the other fellow, and I say the other fellow, every time,"
he observed.

"Still," said Jurgis, reflectively, "he never did us any harm."

"He was doing it to somebody as hard as he could, you can be sure of
that," said his friend.


Duane had already explained to Jurgis that if a man of their trade were
known he would have to work all the time to satisfy the demands of the
police. Therefore it would be better for Jurgis to stay in hiding and
never be seen in public with his pal. But Jurgis soon got very tired
of staying in hiding. In a couple of weeks he was feeling strong and
beginning to use his arm, and then he could not stand it any longer.
Duane, who had done a job of some sort by himself, and made a truce with
the powers, brought over Marie, his little French girl, to share with
him; but even that did not avail for long, and in the end he had to give
up arguing, and take Jurgis out and introduce him to the saloons and
"sporting houses" where the big crooks and "holdup men" hung out.

And so Jurgis got a glimpse of the high-class criminal world of
Chicago. The city, which was owned by an oligarchy of businessmen, being
nominally ruled by the people, a huge army of graft was necessary for
the purpose of effecting the transfer of power. Twice a year, in the
spring and fall elections, millions of dollars were furnished by the
businessmen and expended by this army; meetings were held and clever
speakers were hired, bands played and rockets sizzled, tons of documents
and reservoirs of drinks were distributed, and tens of thousands of
votes were bought for cash. And this army of graft had, of course, to be
maintained the year round. The leaders and organizers were maintained by
the businessmen directly--aldermen and legislators by means of bribes,
party officials out of the campaign funds, lobbyists and corporation
lawyers in the form of salaries, contractors by means of jobs, labor
union leaders by subsidies, and newspaper proprietors and editors by
advertisements. The rank and file, however, were either foisted upon the
city, or else lived off the population directly. There was the police
department, and the fire and water departments, and the whole balance
of the civil list, from the meanest office boy to the head of a city
department; and for the horde who could find no room in these, there was
the world of vice and crime, there was license to seduce, to swindle
and plunder and prey. The law forbade Sunday drinking; and this had
delivered the saloon-keepers into the hands of the police, and made an
alliance between them necessary. The law forbade prostitution; and this
had brought the "madames" into the combination. It was the same with the
gambling-house keeper and the poolroom man, and the same with any other
man or woman who had a means of getting "graft," and was willing to
pay over a share of it: the green-goods man and the highwayman, the
pickpocket and the sneak thief, and the receiver of stolen goods,
the seller of adulterated milk, of stale fruit and diseased meat, the
proprietor of unsanitary tenements, the fake doctor and the usurer, the
beggar and the "pushcart man," the prize fighter and the professional
slugger, the race-track "tout," the procurer, the white-slave agent, and
the expert seducer of young girls. All of these agencies of corruption
were banded together, and leagued in blood brotherhood with the
politician and the police; more often than not they were one and the
same person,--the police captain would own the brothel he pretended
to raid, the politician would open his headquarters in his saloon.
"Hinkydink" or "Bathhouse John," or others of that ilk, were proprietors
of the most notorious dives in Chicago, and also the "gray wolves"
of the city council, who gave away the streets of the city to the
businessmen; and those who patronized their places were the gamblers and
prize fighters who set the law at defiance, and the burglars and holdup
men who kept the whole city in terror. On election day all these powers
of vice and crime were one power; they could tell within one per cent
what the vote of their district would be, and they could change it at an
hour's notice.

A month ago Jurgis had all but perished of starvation upon the streets;
and now suddenly, as by the gift of a magic key, he had entered into a
world where money and all the good things of life came freely. He was
introduced by his friend to an Irishman named "Buck" Halloran, who was
a political "worker" and on the inside of things. This man talked with
Jurgis for a while, and then told him that he had a little plan by which
a man who looked like a workingman might make some easy money; but it
was a private affair, and had to be kept quiet. Jurgis expressed himself
as agreeable, and the other took him that afternoon (it was Saturday) to
a place where city laborers were being paid off. The paymaster sat in
a little booth, with a pile of envelopes before him, and two policemen
standing by. Jurgis went, according to directions, and gave the name of
"Michael O'Flaherty," and received an envelope, which he took around the
corner and delivered to Halloran, who was waiting for him in a saloon.
Then he went again; and gave the name of "Johann Schmidt," and a third
time, and give the name of "Serge Reminitsky." Halloran had quite a list
of imaginary workingmen, and Jurgis got an envelope for each one. For
this work he received five dollars, and was told that he might have it
every week, so long as he kept quiet. As Jurgis was excellent at keeping
quiet, he soon won the trust of "Buck" Halloran, and was introduced to
others as a man who could be depended upon.

This acquaintance was useful to him in another way, also before long
Jurgis made his discovery of the meaning of "pull," and just why his
boss, Connor, and also the pugilist bartender, had been able to send him
to jail. One night there was given a ball, the "benefit" of "One-eyed
Larry," a lame man who played the violin in one of the big "high-class"
houses of prostitution on Clark Street, and was a wag and a popular
character on the "Levee." This ball was held in a big dance hall, and
was one of the occasions when the city's powers of debauchery gave
themselves up to madness. Jurgis attended and got half insane with
drink, and began quarreling over a girl; his arm was pretty strong by
then, and he set to work to clean out the place, and ended in a cell in
the police station. The police station being crowded to the doors, and
stinking with "bums," Jurgis did not relish staying there to sleep off
his liquor, and sent for Halloran, who called up the district leader and
had Jurgis bailed out by telephone at four o'clock in the morning. When
he was arraigned that same morning, the district leader had already seen
the clerk of the court and explained that Jurgis Rudkus was a decent
fellow, who had been indiscreet; and so Jurgis was fined ten dollars and
the fine was "suspended"--which meant that he did not have to pay for
it, and never would have to pay it, unless somebody chose to bring it up
against him in the future.

Among the people Jurgis lived with now money was valued according to an
entirely different standard from that of the people of Packingtown; yet,
strange as it may seem, he did a great deal less drinking than he had
as a workingman. He had not the same provocations of exhaustion and
hopelessness; he had now something to work for, to struggle for. He
soon found that if he kept his wits about him, he would come upon new
opportunities; and being naturally an active man, he not only kept sober
himself, but helped to steady his friend, who was a good deal fonder of
both wine and women than he.

One thing led to another. In the saloon where Jurgis met "Buck" Halloran
he was sitting late one night with Duane, when a "country customer"
(a buyer for an out-of-town merchant) came in, a little more than half
"piped." There was no one else in the place but the bartender, and as
the man went out again Jurgis and Duane followed him; he went round
the corner, and in a dark place made by a combination of the elevated
railroad and an unrented building, Jurgis leaped forward and shoved a
revolver under his nose, while Duane, with his hat pulled over his eyes,
went through the man's pockets with lightning fingers. They got his
watch and his "wad," and were round the corner again and into the saloon
before he could shout more than once. The bartender, to whom they had
tipped the wink, had the cellar door open for them, and they vanished,
making their way by a secret entrance to a brothel next door. From the
roof of this there was access to three similar places beyond. By means
of these passages the customers of any one place could be gotten out
of the way, in case a falling out with the police chanced to lead to a
raid; and also it was necessary to have a way of getting a girl out
of reach in case of an emergency. Thousands of them came to Chicago
answering advertisements for "servants" and "factory hands," and found
themselves trapped by fake employment agencies, and locked up in a
bawdyhouse. It was generally enough to take all their clothes away from
them; but sometimes they would have to be "doped" and kept prisoners for
weeks; and meantime their parents might be telegraphing the police, and
even coming on to see why nothing was done. Occasionally there was no
way of satisfying them but to let them search the place to which the
girl had been traced.

For his help in this little job, the bartender received twenty out of
the hundred and thirty odd dollars that the pair secured; and naturally
this put them on friendly terms with him, and a few days later he
introduced them to a little "sheeny" named Goldberger, one of the
"runners" of the "sporting house" where they had been hidden. After a
few drinks Goldberger began, with some hesitation, to narrate how he had
had a quarrel over his best girl with a professional "cardsharp," who
had hit him in the jaw. The fellow was a stranger in Chicago, and if he
was found some night with his head cracked there would be no one to care
very much. Jurgis, who by this time would cheerfully have cracked the
heads of all the gamblers in Chicago, inquired what would be coming to
him; at which the Jew became still more confidential, and said that he
had some tips on the New Orleans races, which he got direct from the
police captain of the district, whom he had got out of a bad scrape, and
who "stood in" with a big syndicate of horse owners. Duane took all
this in at once, but Jurgis had to have the whole race-track situation
explained to him before he realized the importance of such an
opportunity.

There was the gigantic Racing Trust. It owned the legislatures in
every state in which it did business; it even owned some of the big
newspapers, and made public opinion--there was no power in the land that
could oppose it unless, perhaps, it were the Poolroom Trust. It built
magnificent racing parks all over the country, and by means of enormous
purses it lured the people to come, and then it organized a gigantic
shell game, whereby it plundered them of hundreds of millions of dollars
every year. Horse racing had once been a sport, but nowadays it was
a business; a horse could be "doped" and doctored, undertrained or
overtrained; it could be made to fall at any moment--or its gait could
be broken by lashing it with the whip, which all the spectators would
take to be a desperate effort to keep it in the lead. There were scores
of such tricks; and sometimes it was the owners who played them and made
fortunes, sometimes it was the jockeys and trainers, sometimes it was
outsiders, who bribed them--but most of the time it was the chiefs
of the trust. Now for instance, they were having winter racing in New
Orleans and a syndicate was laying out each day's program in advance,
and its agents in all the Northern cities were "milking" the poolrooms.
The word came by long-distance telephone in a cipher code, just a little
while before each race; and any man who could get the secret had as good
as a fortune. If Jurgis did not believe it, he could try it, said the
little Jew--let them meet at a certain house on the morrow and make a
test. Jurgis was willing, and so was Duane, and so they went to one
of the high-class poolrooms where brokers and merchants gambled (with
society women in a private room), and they put up ten dollars each upon
a horse called "Black Beldame," a six to one shot, and won. For a secret
like that they would have done a good many sluggings--but the next day
Goldberger informed them that the offending gambler had got wind of what
was coming to him, and had skipped the town.


There were ups and downs at the business; but there was always a living,
inside of a jail, if not out of it. Early in April the city elections
were due, and that meant prosperity for all the powers of graft. Jurgis,
hanging round in dives and gambling houses and brothels, met with
the heelers of both parties, and from their conversation he came to
understand all the ins and outs of the game, and to hear of a number of
ways in which he could make himself useful about election time. "Buck"
Halloran was a "Democrat," and so Jurgis became a Democrat also; but he
was not a bitter one--the Republicans were good fellows, too, and were
to have a pile of money in this next campaign. At the last election the
Republicans had paid four dollars a vote to the Democrats' three; and
"Buck" Halloran sat one night playing cards with Jurgis and another man,
who told how Halloran had been charged with the job voting a "bunch" of
thirty-seven newly landed Italians, and how he, the narrator, had met
the Republican worker who was after the very same gang, and how the
three had effected a bargain, whereby the Italians were to vote half and
half, for a glass of beer apiece, while the balance of the fund went to
the conspirators!

Not long after this, Jurgis, wearying of the risks and vicissitudes
of miscellaneous crime, was moved to give up the career for that of a
politician. Just at this time there was a tremendous uproar being raised
concerning the alliance between the criminals and the police. For the
criminal graft was one in which the businessmen had no direct part--it
was what is called a "side line," carried by the police. "Wide
open" gambling and debauchery made the city pleasing to "trade," but
burglaries and holdups did not. One night it chanced that while Jack
Duane was drilling a safe in a clothing store he was caught red-handed
by the night watchman, and turned over to a policeman, who chanced to
know him well, and who took the responsibility of letting him make his
escape. Such a howl from the newspapers followed this that Duane was
slated for sacrifice, and barely got out of town in time. And just at
that juncture it happened that Jurgis was introduced to a man named
Harper whom he recognized as the night watchman at Brown's, who had been
instrumental in making him an American citizen, the first year of his
arrival at the yards. The other was interested in the coincidence, but
did not remember Jurgis--he had handled too many "green ones" in his
time, he said. He sat in a dance hall with Jurgis and Halloran until one
or two in the morning, exchanging experiences. He had a long story to
tell of his quarrel with the superintendent of his department, and how
he was now a plain workingman, and a good union man as well. It was not
until some months afterward that Jurgis understood that the quarrel with
the superintendent had been prearranged, and that Harper was in reality
drawing a salary of twenty dollars a week from the packers for an inside
report of his union's secret proceedings. The yards were seething with
agitation just then, said the man, speaking as a unionist. The people of
Packingtown had borne about all that they would bear, and it looked as
if a strike might begin any week.

After this talk the man made inquiries concerning Jurgis, and a couple
of days later he came to him with an interesting proposition. He was
not absolutely certain, he said, but he thought that he could get him
a regular salary if he would come to Packingtown and do as he was told,
and keep his mouth shut. Harper--"Bush" Harper, he was called--was a
right-hand man of Mike Scully, the Democratic boss of the stockyards;
and in the coming election there was a peculiar situation. There had
come to Scully a proposition to nominate a certain rich brewer who lived
upon a swell boulevard that skirted the district, and who coveted the
big badge and the "honorable" of an alderman. The brewer was a Jew, and
had no brains, but he was harmless, and would put up a rare campaign
fund. Scully had accepted the offer, and then gone to the Republicans
with a proposition. He was not sure that he could manage the "sheeny,"
and he did not mean to take any chances with his district; let the
Republicans nominate a certain obscure but amiable friend of Scully's,
who was now setting tenpins in the cellar of an Ashland Avenue saloon,
and he, Scully, would elect him with the "sheeny's" money, and the
Republicans might have the glory, which was more than they would get
otherwise. In return for this the Republicans would agree to put up no
candidate the following year, when Scully himself came up for reelection
as the other alderman from the ward. To this the Republicans had
assented at once; but the hell of it was--so Harper explained--that
the Republicans were all of them fools--a man had to be a fool to be
a Republican in the stockyards, where Scully was king. And they didn't
know how to work, and of course it would not do for the Democratic
workers, the noble redskins of the War Whoop League, to support the
Republican openly. The difficulty would not have been so great except
for another fact--there had been a curious development in stockyards
politics in the last year or two, a new party having leaped into being.
They were the Socialists; and it was a devil of a mess, said "Bush"
Harper. The one image which the word "Socialist" brought to Jurgis was
of poor little Tamoszius Kuszleika, who had called himself one, and
would go out with a couple of other men and a soap-box, and shout
himself hoarse on a street corner Saturday nights. Tamoszius had tried
to explain to Jurgis what it was all about, but Jurgis, who was not of
an imaginative turn, had never quire got it straight; at present he was
content with his companion's explanation that the Socialists were the
enemies of American institutions--could not be bought, and would not
combine or make any sort of a "dicker." Mike Scully was very much
worried over the opportunity which his last deal gave to them--the
stockyards Democrats were furious at the idea of a rich capitalist
for their candidate, and while they were changing they might possibly
conclude that a Socialist firebrand was preferable to a Republican bum.
And so right here was a chance for Jurgis to make himself a place in
the world, explained "Bush" Harper; he had been a union man, and he
was known in the yards as a workingman; he must have hundreds of
acquaintances, and as he had never talked politics with them he might
come out as a Republican now without exciting the least suspicion. There
were barrels of money for the use of those who could deliver the goods;
and Jurgis might count upon Mike Scully, who had never yet gone back on
a friend. Just what could he do? Jurgis asked, in some perplexity, and
the other explained in detail. To begin with, he would have to go to the
yards and work, and he mightn't relish that; but he would have what he
earned, as well as the rest that came to him. He would get active in the
union again, and perhaps try to get an office, as he, Harper, had; he
would tell all his friends the good points of Doyle, the Republican
nominee, and the bad ones of the "sheeny"; and then Scully would
furnish a meeting place, and he would start the "Young Men's Republican
Association," or something of that sort, and have the rich brewer's
best beer by the hogshead, and fireworks and speeches, just like the
War Whoop League. Surely Jurgis must know hundreds of men who would like
that sort of fun; and there would be the regular Republican leaders and
workers to help him out, and they would deliver a big enough majority on
election day.

When he had heard all this explanation to the end, Jurgis demanded: "But
how can I get a job in Packingtown? I'm blacklisted."

At which "Bush" Harper laughed. "I'll attend to that all right," he
said.

And the other replied, "It's a go, then; I'm your man." So Jurgis went
out to the stockyards again, and was introduced to the political lord of
the district, the boss of Chicago's mayor. It was Scully who owned the
brickyards and the dump and the ice pond--though Jurgis did not know it.
It was Scully who was to blame for the unpaved street in which Jurgis's
child had been drowned; it was Scully who had put into office the
magistrate who had first sent Jurgis to jail; it was Scully who was
principal stockholder in the company which had sold him the ramshackle
tenement, and then robbed him of it. But Jurgis knew none of these
things--any more than he knew that Scully was but a tool and puppet of
the packers. To him Scully was a mighty power, the "biggest" man he had
ever met.