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Kitty Reardon would almost rather face a beating than attend tonight's special bargaining session. But her family had always come out against the coal barons at contract time, so she had no choice.
Her shift ended, she headed straight for the main shaft and rode out of the tunnel alone. Aboveground, the cold Kentucky rain kept her company as she dashed across the parking lot--no mean feat in steel-toed boots.
Her car smelled musty and she needed some fresh air after being cooped up all day, so the first thing she did was open the side vent. Then she laid her coat on the front seat, set her pit helmet on the floor, and opened her black metal lunch pail.
The neatly folded neckerchief that she'd packed along with her sandwich that morning had been her grandfather's most prized possession. While time had dulled its purity of color, nothing could dim its purpose. Her grandfather had worn this to bargaining sessions, and she planned to wear it tonight to show her solidarity with her family's past.
October thundered an angry omen as Kitty tied the red kerchief around her neck. She knocked on wood, her own head, then reached to adjust the rearview mirror. A glimpse of her reflection in the glass gave her a moment's pause. Her face was blackened--the trademark of a miner.
She'd never met Benjamin Cooper, the coal baron; she'd seen him only from a distance, but she was no stranger to his brand of scare tactics. This time he was threatening to close shop unless the miners took a twenty percent pay cut. And that was what had her up in arms right now. She could not let him get away with it.
The other reason was economic survival. A four thousand dollar a year paycut might be pocket change to a playboy-industrialist, but to a single working mother like Kitty it was the difference between a living wage and a corn bread existence.
Bolstered by the strength of her convictions, she fastened her seat belt and started the car. Driving through the gates that served both entering and exiting vehicles at Cooper's No. 9 she shook a mental fist at the large sign that warned THE BEST SAFETY DEVICE IS A CAREFUL MAN.
"Someday..." she vowed on behalf of women miners everywhere. For now, though, she had her hands full.
Everyone joked that the road down the mountain was crooked enough to run for Congress. No one laughed. In truth, it looked as if a tar pot had overturned at the top and trickled a wicked course to the bottom.
Tonight Kitty drove slower than usual. Lightning had felled a tree just outside the gates, blocking an entire lane. She maneuvered around it cautiously and found that the rain combined with the coal dust that coated everything nearby had made the shoulderless asphalt surface dangerously slick.
At each bent-back curve, the headlights of her trusty old Chevy shone off into the clouds that hung over Cooperville. The wet mountain gloom obscured her view of the valley, but she knew what lay below: a long gray town built on hope; a copper-roofed mansion built on a hill; a graveyard built on heartache.
She'd cut her teeth on tales of her grandfather's heroics in forming the union and her father's hand in organizing the Black Lung Association. But even with her place at the bargaining table preordained, she worried she was biting off more than she could chew.
Her actions tonight would not get her fired; a fading neckerchief and a fomenting speech were not grounds for dismissal. Still, the coal baron had his supporters among the miners--men and women who believed that a job at lower pay was better than no job at all. If they thought she was jumping the gun and decided to join forces against her...
Kitty shrugged aside her misgivings, thinking there was no point in borrowing trouble. Besides, with lightning trying to outdo thunder in scaring her, she'd be lucky if she didn't lose her nerve!
Without taking her eyes off the next hairpin curve, she leaned down and searched fruitlessly in the plastic floor caddy for a stick of gum or a piece of candy. She remembered that when she dropped Jessie off at school for basketball practice that morning her daughter had had a suspicious wad in her cheek. She made a mental note to replenish her stash when she went to the store.
Something made her sit up suddenly and check the rearview mirror. Her heart stalled as a pair of headlights cut around that last curve and glared back at her. The other car drew rapidly nearer and, too late, she realized it was going too fast to stop. It would hit her.
The thin mountain air vibrated with the squealing of tires, the crunch of metal, and the shattering of glass.
Kitty felt the impact of the crash in the very marrow of her bones. Her seat belt protected her from serious injury, but nothing could have prepared her for the shock of feeling the Chevy lurch forward and roll toward the edge.
Reacting instinctively, she clutched the steering wheel as if it were a life preserver and laid on the brakes. The car's front end swung left, its damaged rear end right as it slewed down the rain-and-dust-slick road.
With the precipice looming, visions of her beloved Jessie flashed before her eyes, and prayers she'd thought she'd forgotten tripped from her lips.
"Lay off the brakes!"
Though Kitty heard the voice through the open side vent, she didn't question its source. She simply eased up on the brake pedal.
"Now steer into the slide!"
Once again she did as ordered. She turned the wheel to the left as smoothly as any Grand Prix champion.
The Chevy glided to a stop mere inches from the edge.
When the car was still, Kitty just sat there, her head reeling at the horror of how close she'd come to being killed. Then her heart danced for joy'she was still alive.
