SHERIFF CHAFIN—THE CZAR OF Logan—smiled to himself, thumbing a pea-size scar on his chest, kneading it beneath his fine cotton shirt. His men were digging trenches and felling trees, erecting breastworks along the northern border of Logan County. The latest rumors put the Rednecks in excess of ten thousand men—an army of miners who thought they were going to march into his county, hang him from a sour apple tree, and continue down to Mingo, springing their comrades from jail and running the Baldwins to ground.
The Czar sniffed. First, they’d have to get past Blair Mountain, the double-headed green monster where he was establishing his defensive front. To bolster his standing force of three hundred deputies, he was raising a regiment of special constables, mine guards, Baldwins, and other toughs called in from around the state. What’s more, he’d formed a law-and-order committee like the one down in Mingo. Townsmen had turned out in droves, breathless to heed the call of duty. When the time came, they would muster at the sound of the Logan fire alarm and convoy to the front in a fleet of private automobiles.
Already, the gun racks at the hardware stores and pawn shops stood stripped of arms, every last rifle requisitioned for the county defense, and the stockpile of military-grade weaponry at the Logan arsenal had been distributed among his deputies. One thousand rifles, ten belt-fed heavy machine guns, and sixty-seven thousand rounds of ammunition. The machine guns were being positioned at strategic mountain passes and choke points to provide overlapping fields of fire.
He’d known this day might come; he’d been preparing, planning his defense. The governor was up in his office in the state capital filing formal requests for the federal government to send in troops, but Chafin couldn’t count on those damned wrigglers in Washington to move their feet. Not soon enough. These miners had taken the killing of Sid Hatfield like the murder of a brother or son.
The Czar touched the little nipple of scar on his chest, four inches beneath his bowtie. Two years ago, he’d got deep into the rye during a trip to the state capital and the brown water had gone roaring through his head like a torrent, sending him to the Union’s state office with his pistol out, ready to rile the scum bastards at gunpoint, prod them about like a bunch of fat heifers at auction. Maybe make them waltz or dance the polka. He’d received a .22 caliber bullet from a Union vice president during that incident. It failed to kill him but left a tiny third nipple, like a little kiss from God.
“Sumbitch should of used a bigger caliber,” he liked to tell people.
Now he was standing at home plate of the county baseball field, thumbing that little scar. He’d instructed his deputies to go into the scab camps and conscript every last miner at the threat of losing his job. Objectors were to be thrown in the county jail, packed ten-deep if need be, their arms busting out through the bars. Let them piss in their shoes. He aimed to build a volunteer army of three thousand defenders and wall off the county like a mountain fortress. His men might be outnumbered, but they’d hold the high ground, entrenched along the ridges with high-powers and automatic weapons, ready to pour fire into the mountain passes and narrow roads leading into the county.
Now one of his deputies came hustling up. “We just got the news on the wire, sir. Mother Jones has been sighted on a train heading down the Kanawha River. She’s on her way to meet the marchers.”
The Czar felt a cold little twinge at the sound of the name. “Mother Fucking Jones,” he muttered. The old bitch had called for his head more than once, urging the miners to string him up or knock him down. She was a force; he couldn’t argue that. Still, looking out across the county ballfield, the Czar felt his smile coming back into his face, even wider than before.
The deputy held his hat in his hands. “What should we do, sir?”
The Czar nodded toward the squadron arrayed in the outfield. Flying ships built of canvas and wood and wire, wasp-light and deadly, their wooden propellers cocked slantwise. Secret weapons he’d been itching to loose. Dreaming of it.
He sniffed. “Let the old bitch come.”