A Plague Year (16 page)

Wendy’s blond head stayed frozen in place until the end of my monologue. Then she whispered back, “First of all, if I am on that site, that guy is lying about me.”

“So you know about the site, and the guy? Is he your boyfriend or something?”

“That would fall under the category of none of your business.”

I pulled away, angrier than ever. I leaned back and demanded to know, “It was that guy at the Halloween party, wasn’t it?”

After a moment, she conceded, “Yes.”

“You were making out with him.”

She finally answered, “I was drunk. I was making out with you, too.”

“Yeah. I remember. So, did he ask you out after that?”

“Yes, he did. He wanted me to go back to his room that
night, and I said no, and I guess that’s why he’s telling lies about me.”

“So he did this as revenge?”

“I guess, yeah.” After a long pause, she looked straight at me. She softened her voice. “Look, Tom, I’m really sorry about what happened at the party. I was drinking, and I should not drink. It’s a problem for me.” She added, “That’s why I’m in the counseling group.”

After a long pause, I finally managed to mumble, “Okay.”

Mr. Proctor walked over and stood right in front of me. He rarely got annoyed at talkers, but he was today. He asked coldly, “Are you two finished?”

I answered for both of us. “Yes.”

“Then let me get your attention up here.” He raised his voice. “Let me get everybody’s attention up here, please.” Mr. Proctor pulled out his marker and stepped to the whiteboard. He drew a rectangle with a curvy right side. He called over his shoulder, “What does this look like?”

Ben answered, “A rectangle?”

“No. What state in the United States does it look like? I’ll give you a hint: We’re living in it now.”

Several people chorused: “Pennsylvania.”

“That’s right. Your state. My state. Now listen to this, because it is important: Pennsylvania was once considered to be a Garden of Eden by Europeans. Many religious communities, utopian communities, settled here. They lived off the bounty of the land, in a Garden of Eden, just like the villagers of Eyam. Then, just as in Eyam, just as in Eden, something evil arrived, something so horrible that it was able to destroy everyone and everything.

“For the town of Eyam, that something was the bubonic
plague. For Pennsylvania, that something was methamphetamine. For both places, it signaled the start of a plague year.”

He looked out at the class. “Those of you who are writing journals, I want you to keep this in mind.” He picked up a leather-bound classic. “In
Paradise Lost
, John Milton describes man’s fall from the Garden of Eden. So … who will tell the story of man’s fall from the beautiful land that was Pennsylvania? Will it be one of you?”

He looked right at me. On another day, I might have been excited. I might have been honored. But right then I couldn’t even register what he was saying.

I was in my own world, and it was a world full of pain.

All I could think about was that college guy. And what he had done to Wendy. And what he had done to me. And what he had said to me. And what I should do about it.

By the end of class, though, I had my answer. I turned and asked Arthur urgently, “Will you drive me to the college on Saturday?”

“Why?”

“I think I need to beat a guy up.”

“Righteous! Who is it?”

“A guy who started a website.”

“Really? Why?”

“He put lies on it about Wendy.”

Arthur looked disappointed. “The Grape? Come on, cuz. Can’t we come up with a better reason than that?”

“And he insulted me at the party.”

“There you go. What did he say?”

“He called me her ‘little townie friend.’ And he told me to go home.”

Arthur practically snapped to attention. “Oh, did he now?”

“Yeah. Can you help me? I’ve never done anything like this before.”

“Definitely. You leave everything to me.”

“No. No, I want to do this myself. I just want you to drive me there. And maybe help me find him.”

“Yellow Corvette.”

“What?”

“Are we talking about the dude who was making out with the Grape?”

“Yeah.”

“Little curly-haired guy?”

“Uh-huh.”

“I saw him get into a yellow Corvette.”

“So we just need to find that?”

“Yeah. Then what?”

I heard myself say, “I’ll take care of the rest.”

I couldn’t even look at Arthur. He might have been laughing at me. But he sounded serious enough when he replied, “I’ll do whatever you need me to do, cuz.”

The field trip to the Ashland coal mine began just like the one to the flight 93 crash site. There were three fewer passengers, though, since the high school stoners had not signed up.

Jimmy Giles was sitting up front again with his hand on the door. Catherine Lyle was driving. Wendy Lyle was sitting alone behind her, reading a novel. (Maybe it was another novel about someone who was beautiful on the outside but ugly on the inside.)

I was in the back row, next to Arthur. Jenny was right in front of me, between Ben and Mikeszabo. Her hair was hanging over the back of the seat, just inches in front of me. It looked and smelled really nice. Long and brown, with highlights. Very shiny.
In fact, all of Jenny looked nice. I haven’t mentioned that before, but I should have.

Arthur was asleep with his head against the glass the entire way up there. I pulled out my PSAT book and tried to do some math problems, but I was way too distracted to work. I was still angry, scared, and pumped up about our plan to go after that college guy.

It wasn’t long before we were cruising down the main street of a small town. Catherine Lyle found the mine quickly and pulled into its parking lot. It was a pretty small operation, with a gift shop, the mine itself, and a train ride. I guess it gets crowded some days, but on this day the lot was empty.

Mrs. Lyle parked the Suburban in a space right across from the gift shop and we trooped in. All the gifts in the shop—and there were hundreds of them—were based on anthracite coal. They even had coal candy.

A short, skinny woman with a pointed nose stood behind the cash register. We lined up in front of her and purchased tickets for the next tour. A guy in coveralls and a miner’s helmet sauntered in and watched us, smiling. As soon as we all had tickets, he announced, “Are you ready to get to work? Okay, come on, then!”

He led us outside toward the mine entrance. A small engine was sitting there on railroad tracks. It had three yellow coal cars attached to it. The guy climbed into the engine cab and called out, “Hop on board, you coal miners!”

Wendy Lyle and her stepmother got into the first coal car. Arthur and his stepfather chose the second, and I joined Jenny and the guys in the last one.

The guide told us, “This is a real coal mine, folks, although no one is currently working it. It has been in operation in various forms for nearly one hundred years.

“We’ll be following the tracks of the coal cars down into the mine, where the temperature is always fifty-two degrees Fahrenheit. We will get out, walk around, and see the sights common to coal miners approximately seventy-five years ago.”

The little train took off with a lurch. We pushed through a pair of wooden doors, leaving the daylight behind. We rolled past walls of rocks and wooden beams, moving steadily downward, our way lit by a series of red lanterns hanging on the walls.

The guide pointed out, “Those lanterns are electric, folks, but back in the day they would have been kerosene.” Then he added, “Those wooden beams you see won’t really help you in a cave-in, though. Nothing will. They are there mostly to make noise before they crack. The miners had a saying: ‘When the timbers start talking, you’d better start walking.’ ”

The train came to a halt in an open area crammed with prop items—tools, wheelbarrows, dummies of men and mules. The guide got out and walked over to a wall of pure anthracite. We followed and formed a semicircle in front of him.

“Seventy-five years ago,” he began, “coal miners and their helpers would chip away at veins of anthracite just like this one. They would fill carts with it, and mules would drag those carts to the surface.”

He pointed to Ben, Mikeszabo, and me. “The mules wouldn’t stop there, though. They’d keep pulling the coal up the hill to the breaker house. That’s where boys like you would be waiting. For ninety cents a day, you would sit in the breaker house and sort out the good coal from the rocks and dirt.”

Mikeszabo looked at me and whispered, “That’s not such a bad deal.”

I whispered back, “No. That’s more than I make.”

Jenny asked the man, “What about girls? Could they do that?”

The guide was adamant. “No, ma’am! There were no breaker girls. Just boys. The girls were back home learning how to cook and wash and sew.”

Arthur muttered, “Righteous.”

Jenny sneered at him playfully. But then she complained, “That’s not fair.”

The guide repeated, “No, ma’am. But that’s how it was, and everybody went along with it. Men and women. Boys and girls.”

It was at this point that I first noticed Jimmy Giles.

He did not look well. His face was pale and he appeared to be sweating, despite the fifty-two-degree temperature. His eyes were darting around.

But everybody else was focused on the guide, who continued talking. “And while we’re discussing what’s fair and what isn’t, here’s a question: Who can tell me how many pounds are in a ton?”

Wendy answered before anyone else could. “Two thousand.”

The guide nodded. “Well, you kids know that, and I know that, but the mine owners did not. They insisted that there were two thousand two hundred pounds in a ton. They called it a ‘long ton,’ and they made the miners add another two hundred pounds to every ton if they wanted to get paid.”

As we all contemplated that injustice, Jimmy took a big step away from the group.

Catherine Lyle asked him, “Are you okay, Mr. Giles?”

He whispered hoarsely, “Doomed. I’m doomed to die down here.”

“What’s that?”

“I gotta get out!”

Catherine Lyle turned to the guide. “Where is the nearest exit?”

He looked puzzled. “Well, there’s the way we came in, and there’s the way we’ll go out.”

“This man needs to go out. It’s an emergency.”

I guess it took the guide a moment too long to respond. Maybe he was hoping to finish his speech—I don’t know—but Jimmy could not wait. He squeezed behind the last coal car, got onto the tracks, and started back the way we’d come—walking first and then running.

The guide yelled, “Sir! You can’t do that.” He told us, “Everybody hop back in. I’ll get us out right now.”

We all clambered back into our cars, except for Arthur. He took off after Jimmy, scrambling as best he could over the wooden rail ties.

The train lurched forward and quickly picked up speed. We barreled around several curves before we hit another pair of doors and broke into the daylight.

The guide screeched to a halt, jumped out, and ran to the entrance. We all followed.

The guide pushed open the left wooden door and peered inside. He called over to us, “I see them! They’re okay!”

A minute later, Jimmy and Arthur emerged, blinking in the sunlight. Arthur had his hand cupped under Jimmy’s arm. Jimmy was covered with sweat and he was breathing hard, but he did manage to say, “I’m all right. I’m sorry, everybody. I’m sorry.”

Catherine asked, “Is there anything I can get you, Mr. Giles? Some water?”

Jimmy nodded, so Catherine and Wendy took off for the gift shop.

Jimmy repeated, “I am really sorry. I guess I wasn’t ready to go back down there. I messed up everybody’s trip.”

We all gathered around and assured him he hadn’t.

“It’s okay.”

“We saw enough.”

“Don’t worry about it.”

We moved toward the gift shop in a bunch. Catherine Lyle met us at the door. She was holding Jimmy’s bottle of water. No one else had money, so we just stood around and watched him drink it.

I should say no one else had money except Wendy. She went back in and shopped for jewelry. She wound up purchasing an anthracite heart on a silver chain.

A black heart.

Yeah.

When we were all back in the Suburban, Jimmy apologized some more, and everybody reassured him some more.

Arthur, who hadn’t said a word on the ride up, talked the whole way back. In a lowered voice, he told me, “Jimmy Giles was a wildcat miner when I first met him, but I don’t think he did it for too long.”

“Well, it’d be tough to be a miner if you were afraid of tunnels.”

“Yeah. It’s like if you were a roofer and afraid of heights.”

“Or a sailor afraid of water.”

“Right. So then Jimmy and Warren bought the flatbed truck. They hauled pine trees for the government, to make turpentine. They were supposed to haul a hundred trees at a time. They hauled maybe sixty, but they still got paid for a hundred. Jimmy used to say it was close enough for government work.

“Then they started moving college kids in and out of frats and dorms. They moved them in in September and moved them out in June. But you can’t work for just two months a year, so they came up with the idea of the Christmas-tree run.”