The Trainmasters Read Online Free PDF Page A

over a dram of Irish blood spilled in its
     making.
    Contracts for the tunnel had been signed in 1851, though its completion was expected in 1853, when at a length of 3,570 feet,
     it would be one of the longest railway tunnels in the country. It was, more significantly, one of the most difficult holes
     to dig, and one of the most dangerous.
    Late on a Saturday afternoon, along with twenty mates, Egan awaited his turn to be lifted out of the tunnel. He would be hauled
     to the earth’s surface in a metal cage attached to a steam-powered winch at the top of the four-hundred-foot shaft.
    With a screech of metal grinding on metal, the cage returned to the tunnel floor for another load. The next gang of men climbed
     in; they were crowded closer together than sheep in a slaughtering pen. The cage was only ten feet square.
    With a great, tumultuous heave, the cage jerked and began to rise. Egan’s gang was next in line. He hated being down in the
     tunnel where the air was dank and close, and the oily stench of mud and toiling men—many of whom had not washed in weeks—was
     strong. The tunnel floor was a running stream. Except for the lanterns at the actual working sites and at the bottom of the
     shaft, the tunnel was pitch black.
    In addition to the two headings at the eastern and western ends of the tunnel, two more shafts had been sunk, making six tunnel
     headings in all. Egan worked out of the easternmost of these shafts. Although a third shaft had recently been attempted, the
     surrounding ground was too unstable, so the shaft had been abandoned.
    That was a typical problem at the Gallitzin Tunnel. Most of the ground penetrated was wet and muddy, requiring extensive shoring
     and foundation work. Egan’s job, therefore, was doubly perilous.
    Yet such danger did not affect the workers’ pay. Since the men who labored on the tunnel were Irish, they were all paid Irish
     wages, $1.15 a day. Out of this sum the men were expected to purchase their own room and board and tools.
    That didn’t leave much for themselves or their families, but it was better than nothing. And nothing was what was available
     elsewhere.
    Egan O’Rahilly was a young man of twenty-two with a family to support. His wife, Deirdre, and their young daughter, Peg, lived
     in a cellar room in Philadelphia. He adored Deirdre and Peg limitlessly, and he missed them more than he missed working in
     the light. He thus sent home the greater portion of his weekly pay.
    Other men were not as generous; they spent most of their wages on drink or on the few hard, ancient, and ugly camp whores
     who had set themselves up nearby. Egan did not blame the other men for taking what comfort they could get in the groggery
     next to the camp, or from the whores. Their jobs were physically exhausting and mentally debilitating.
    Although Egan joined his mates in the groggery after work, it was for the companionship, not the oblivion alcohol offered.
    Egan was of medium height, slim but tough, wiry, and lithe. His hair was curly and sandy. And his splendid tenor voice was
     his most valuable contribution to the groggery at the end of the day. He liked to sing, and the other men liked to listen
     to him.
    Five years earlier Egan, his younger sisters, Teresa, Maria, and Anna, and his parents had taken the American packet
Queen of the West
from Liverpool to New York. The passage had cost five pounds apiece for space in steerage, and it took seven stormy, tortured
     weeks, during which time Anna, Maria, and the two elder O’Rahillys died of ships’ fever, a form of typhus. After landing in
     New York, the two surviving O’Rahillys went to Philadelphia, but there they separated. Egan, who had met Deirdre on board
     the
Queen of the West
, married her.
    Teresa, who was beautiful and smart, had looked for work in domestic service. And, because she was beautiful and smart, she
     quickly found a position. And just as quickly she lost it. She found another almost immediately.