“Why don’t they pay by check?”
“They tried it, but the saloon-keepers at Coalville charged five per cent. for cashing them and the men kicked.”
“Well, it strikes me it’s pretty dangerous,” remarked Allan.
“Oh, I don’t know. Nothing’s ever happened yet. Robbers, I don’t care how desperate they are, ain’t fond of running up against a gang of men armed with Winchesters,” and he went off to make another tour of the train.
[CHAPTER XXII]
THE TREASURE CHEST
Coalville was a hamlet worthy of its name, for its people not only mined coal, they breathed it, ate it, slept in it, and absorbed it at every pore. The town was divided into two parts, one on the hillside, the other in the valley. That portion on the hillside was popularly known as “Stringtown,” and consisted of row upon row of houses, all built upon the same plan, and arranged upon the slope which mounted gently upward from the mouth of the mine which gave the town its only reason for existence. These houses consisted invariably of three rooms and an attic, and into them were crowded the miners, for the most part Slavs or Poles. They had been brought direct from Europe, the immigration laws to the contrary notwithstanding, shipped out to the mine in car-load lots, assigned to the houses which were to be their homes, supplied with the tools necessary to mining, and put to work. By incessant labour, they were able to earn enough to provide themselves and their ever-increasing families with food enough to keep body and soul together, and clothing enough to cover their nakedness. More they did not ask. They were not compelled to serve in the army, they were not under police surveillance, they paid no taxes. So they were happy and contented, imagining themselves free.
Down in the valley, a quarter of a mile away, was the town proper—that is to say, about a hundred houses, larger, cleaner, and more pretentious than the hovels on the hillside. Here the superintendents lived, the bosses, the office force, and most of the Americans employed about the mine. Here, too, were the bakery, the two stores, supposed to be run upon a competitive basis, but really under one management, and the fifteen saloons into which no small portion of the miners’ wages went, and which yielded an annual profit of about a thousand per cent. on the investment.