Little Hell

Chapter I

Photograph by Unknown

Atlas collapsed. The beams creaked and groaned, and coal dust sifted down. It was black. Dry coughs and distant screams interrupted the heavy quiet. A miner gasped. He turned on his headlamp and put a rag over his mouth and nose. The light struggled to shine on a pair of motionless legs. The other side was crushed.

The miner tore at the rock and dug until his flailing arms knocked his helmet to the ground. Blood and soot ran down his face.

“He didn’t make it,” said John.

“It was his first day. I told him he’d be alright.”

John shook his head. He was a big man. He winced as he propped himself up against the wall.

“Looks like ol’ scratch finally got us.”

Soren looked at the boy’s brand-new boots, barely a scuff. It was just this morning the boy had been a cold canary on his way down the shaft.

“I can’t breathe,” said Marsh.

John tapped Soren’s shoulder. They went to help Marsh. He was trapped between a beam and the floor. John lifted the beam like he was helping to set a wagon wheel. Soren pulled him out.

Marsh tried to push himself up and fell. Soren reached down but Marsh refused. “A broken rib or two ain’t gonna be the end.” He was a cannonball of a man.

He finally got up and grabbed his helmet. He tapped the light and saw the legs.

“He just turned fifteen.”

On the other side of the cavern, pieces of rubble fell giving way to a Judas-hole. A voice came through. “What’s the damage?”

“One dead,” Soren said.

After a moment of silence, the voice spoke again, “And you all?”

“Beat up. Alive. How’s it over there?”

“Bad. Gonna try to dig through to the shaft.”

“You better hurry. It’s gettin’ tight in here,” said Marsh.

The voice left.

Marsh turned to Soren. “Well, Reverend, if you got anything good to say, you better say it now.

“Why do you call him Reverend? Never seen him at church.”

“‘Cause he’s the only positive one in this mine. God must be in there somewhere.”

“Save your breath. We’re gonna need it,” said Soren

They sat in the thickening air, staring. The lamps went out.

Time passed. Soren woke. He was being carried out past the maw of the mine on splintered hemlock. There was light, but no clouds and no sun.

A woman in a filthy dress that hung off her bones stood over Soren. Her hair was wild and her wrinkles were like fissures and her eyes were swollen and bloodshot. She clenched his coat.

“Where’s my boy? Where is he? You said you’d watch him!”

She beat on Soren’s chest until John and Marsh pulled her off. Soren watched her walk away, searching for something she knew was gone. Her cries took longer to fade.

It’s been a week since the collapse. The gray light pressed through the cataract window across a makeshift table in the kitchen. There were dishes soaking in a tin bathtub sitting the corner. The crooked walls were made with what worked. A cast iron ladle hung above an oil drum turned into a stove. It was smoking. The mouth of the furnace grinned. May, Soren’s wife, stepped out the door carrying a bucket.

The air smelled like piss and soot. May splashed the wastewater on the ground and looked across the horse worn path that split the sea of shacks and ran all the way down to the company store. Her face was smoother than most in town, but it had hardened. She went back in. She put the bucket in the corner and went into the bedroom.

The room was small, every piece of furniture touched. Not much light came through the warped window at the foot of the bed. Soren was covered with quilts sewn out of scavenged cloth. There was a dresser with a lone framed picture resting in the middle. The dresser didn’t belong in this town. May sat on the edge of the bed and picked up the picture.

Soren opened his eyes. “You were happy then.”

A tear spilled. “I thought you were gonna sleep all year.”

“You remember that day?”

“I can’t forget. If I do—”

Soren placed his hand on hers. May pulled away and kissed him on the temple. “It’s good to see you’re up. Let me heat up somethin’.” She put the picture on the dresser and left.

Soren sat up. The gaps between the floorboards exposed the cold ground beneath. He stood. His legs trembled in his worn, stained union suit.

He made it to the doorway. May helped him in the chair. “You should be in bed.”

“We’ll be further behind if I don’t get up.”

May put the food on the table and sat down and sipped coffee from a rusty tin cup. “Eat.”

He wiped his face with a handkerchief and studied her in the grey light.

“You’re beautiful.”

“Nothin’ in this town is.”

The door shook. Someone was knocking.

May answered the door. “Soren needs his rest.”

“It’s Mrs. Test. She’s goin’ off on the Baron’s gun thugs.”

Soren made his way to the door.

“Reverend, you’re up.”

“Please quit callin’ him that.”

“She’s causin’ a ruckus in front of the company store.”

Soren put on his jacket.

“You can barely walk.”

“I made her promise, I couldn’t keep. Least I could do is keep her from dyin’.”

It wasn’t long before they emerged from the shacks in front of the company store. It was like a watering hole during a drought—Predator and prey shoulder to shoulder—When they got closer, the crowd, with necks stretched, gaggled around Mrs. Test and Mr. Felts.

“I’m leavin’!” Mrs. Test was holding a miserable suitcase in her bony hands.

“You know you can’t go until you pay off your debt.” Said a Mr. Felts, a company gun.

“Pay—I already paid. My husband…My boy.”

“And your man and that mongrel of yours owe the company. Go on home before you do somethin’ you’ll regret.”

“I’m goin’ down this mountain.”

Soren, leaning on his wife, pushed through the crowd.

“No, you’re not.” Mr. Felts’ voice was from gut to peak.

Mrs. Test’s eyes steeled. She tried to push past the hired gun. Mr. Felts threw her to the ground. Her suitcase flew open. An oxidized family picture fell like the last leaf of fall.

“Come home with May and I,” said Soren.

Mrs. Test rose from the mud, tore a gun from her soiled Sunday dress and fired. The echo silenced the town. Mr. Felts stood expressionless.

A thug cracked Mrs. Test’s skull from behind. She laid in muck and blood, mouth piping like a catfish out of water. Mr. Felts kicked the gun away from her open hand and finished her off with a shot.

“Stupid bitch.”

Soren sagged to the ground.

“Go on everyone. Go home.” Mr. Felts said.

The other thugs rounded everyone up and sent them on their way. In the background two women were complimenting each other’s new hats.

May pulled Soren up. “Come on let’s go.”

“We can’t leave her like that.”

Soren stepped toward Mrs. Test. May grabbed his sleeve.

Mr. Felts had been wiping his gun before he holstered it. “Pay attention to your wife.”

“Let us put her next to her family.”

“Her body’s stayin’. If you want, I can help you go where she goin’.”

Marsh stepped in. “We don’t want none of that.” He took Soren’s arm and turned him toward home.

On the way back, people were gathered in front of their shacks. “She got what she deserved.” “You don’t mess with the law.”

May went to them. “Someone just died. Don’t y’all care?”

Some of the men smiled. May paused, looking them in the eye. John broke the tension. “Alright. A lot’s happened today.”

May turned down the road. Once they arrived home, May looked at John and Marsh. “Why don’t you come in for some coffee?”

“We’d like that.” John said.

They sat around the table sipping coffee. “John, How’s Mrs. Talbert?”

“She’s doing okay. Her cough’s getting better.”

“I got some medicine.”

“You know I can’t take that.”

May got up and went to the bedroom.

They talked until dusk. Soren sat. He didn’t touch his coffee.

Marsh leaned back. “You okay?”

“I’m not leavin’ her out there.”

“Best we let it go. There’s nothin’ we can do.”

Soren stood, grabbed his coat, and left the door swinging. May and John called out, but he kept walking. Mrs. Test yelling for her boy was still loud in his ears. The rain fell.

Mrs. Test was lying in mud and mire on the side of the company store. Soren walked to Mrs. Test’s body.

Mr. Felts came out. His boots clacked on the wood porch. “Store’s closed…Did y’all hear me? I said, the store’s closed.”

“John, Marsh, help me with Mrs. Test,” said Soren.

“I told y’all to leave it.”

Soren folded Mrs. Test’s arms and prepared to pick her up.

Mr. Felts pulled out his club and started down the stairs. A woman came out of the company store. It was Ms. Berwind, the Baron’s eldest daughter.

“Mr. Felts you had your fun.”

Mr. Felts burned an image of Soren in his head and went back in the store. Ms. Berwind followed.

The strong men lifted Mrs. Test. She was heavy. May reached down and took the family photo. Their footsteps sunk in the ground as they carried her to a toolshed. Once inside, they lit some lamps and laid her body on a worktable—

May broke the silence. “John, go grab a shovel from the house. “Marsh, get some water.” She turned to Soren. “Get my dress I’ve been workin’ on.”

Alone, she sobbed. “Erica.”

The men arrived. May wiped her tears without turning. “Y’all get somethin’ to eat.”

May washed Mrs. Test the best she could and combed her hair and dressed her. Before she turned off the lamp, she placed the photo in her hands. It was a dark night.

They woke before the rooster broke in the sunless sky. In their cleanest clothes, they carried Mrs. Test to the town graveyard.

There were broken and tilted crosses stabbed into overgrown mounds. Some graves weren’t marked. Dawn rose and the mute sky touched the treeless hill; Woe, the work-horn sounded. The mine lurched awake.

They took turns digging. Once they were finished, they placed Mrs. Test’s body to rest. Shroudless. Each one grabbed a handful of dirt to consecrate her body.

“Goodbye dear friend. Your family’s waitin’ for you,” May said.

Marsh stayed silent and John said a few words.

Soren crouched next to the hole and let the dirt slip through his hands like an hourglass missing a bottom chamber. “You didn’t deserve this.”