Chapter 19
THE WESTERN UNION TELEGRAPH COMPANY, INCORPORATED
To: H. Sumner Appeal Building, Park Row
H: A FAVOR
-L
THE WESTERN UNION TELEGRAPH COMPANY, INCORPORATED
RECEIVED at: 6:34 P.M. 24 JUL 1905
TO: L. MOORE 9 RIVER RD
SAM FWD’D TO ME — WAS IN PHILLY FOR NAWSA — FLORENCE KELLEY! U OWE ME.
LCL 68 MEETS 7AM LAST FRI OF MO, WALHALLA TOP FLR.
H. SUMNER
“Yeeeess, Hiram,” Laurie murmured, and grinned. “Florence Kelley? Women suffrage? You little bastard, trying to make me jealous.” He scrawled back a response and handed it over to the operator.
One of the last things Irving Sawyer had informed on was that an unknown, bearded gaffer had been sporadically attending Local meetings.
The man had been regarded with suspicion, Irving had said, because he had no references from other Locals, and the eventual consensus was that he couldn’t have been from any other glasshouse but Wright Glass. The bearded man hadn’t been let back.
Laurie had drawn the natural conclusion—that Chary had lied to him and it had been Chary attending.
But… seven AM on a Friday. Chary never would’ve made it to a Local meeting that early, not in Brooklyn. His shift was barely ending then.
It hadn’t been him at the union meetings.
August Wright, alive and well, was attending them, right under his ex-lover’s nose. Risking a hell of a lot to do so, too.
“I’m not standing in the way of unionizing, for the love of Pete!”
Did Chary know? Or was he ignorant to his brother’s actions?
Maybe—maybe, in this one, small thing, Chary had been telling the truth.