The Facilitator

“They’re fencing us all in!”, exclaimed the drunk, this wreck and shell of a man, with such authority as to draw no nevermind.

The saloon was damp from the collective spring rain and toil sweat about the patrons. Never had anyone seen so much rain down the valley, not even The Old Indian, according to the drunk. These patrons, men mostly, crowded about the wooden tables under dimly-lit lamps passing the evening. Here a cowpoke; soiled and weary. There a rail conductor; passed out and drooling. Even the rank air felt tired.

Joshua stood at the bar contemplating the day behind and the day which lay ahead. When he decided to head west, he had not considered what he would become and what he would procreate. Even in this bar, he did not know. Even on his deathbed, he would have no knowledge. Time passes us by as the trains on the rails, proceeding without our comprehension, driving beyond our perceptions.

“They’re fencing us all in, damnit. Even this very valley!”, exclaimed the drunk again, wearing on Joshua’s patience.

When he imagined life out here, Joshua could have foreseen struggle and toil, but he could not account for politics. The valley was moving forward and, per The Governor, Joshua could make 40 cents a rod building these stone fences up and down the state. When he got to this valley, he found he had not accounted for the politics. Damnitall, even this drunk has an opinion on his job. Joshua had just finished his glass and was debating another drink, but he knew it was getting later than he should stay awake. His body needed the shut eye, even if his mind needed the drink.

The job was not challenging, as Joshua was born strong and true, never falling ill, never getting injured, never really having to question or to face doubt with regard to his physical prowess. Born on the coast south of Philadelphia, he was too young to enlist but by the time the war had ended he had earned his honors harvesting hemp for the North’s war efforts. Rope, canvas, oils, and any number of supplies for the victory were manufactured from Joshua’s harvests. While the men went to the war, the children went to the fields. And that is the way it was done.

“They’re stealing our way of life!”, the drunk was wearing on Joshua.

He had enough, not of the drink but of the drunk. Tomorrow is gonna come sooner than he would like and the toil of the day would not be light. He would likely be breaking rock, getting the material unearthed for the men building the actual wall. His boss had seen some ability in him with the stonework, allowing Joshua a raise and leaving him unsupervised most times.

Stumbling back to his tent, Joshua hoped this night would bring no rain so that tomorrow work would go smoothly. Standing in a field in the early humidity of spring is more pleasant when the ground stays under your feet where it's supposed to stay. Even the soil under his bedding was soft across his frame. You get rain anywhere, afterall, so just go to sleep.

The coil is wound.

“Off your lazy ass, young man!” Joshua awoke with a startle as his foreman, Franklin, kicked him in the foot and shouted through the canvas of the tent Joshua had to call home.

Joshua knew Franklin was just giving him a hard time as Franklin saw potential in the lazy, young man. Franklin had in fact called him aside from time to time and let Joshua know how good of a job he was doing breaking rock. Franklin, a large, boisterous man originally from the South had found his freedom during the civil war but had not truly earned it until he had become a foreman for the transcontinental railroad. Franklin Washington was always a free man in his mind at least; truly the only place freedom may exist. Joshua immediately wished to impress his dark-skinned foreman from the moment they had met.

“Eat shit, Boss.”, and Joshua rolled out from under his covers and lobed to the work buggy as the sun began to peek into the valley.

They would be doing what they had been doing for the last couple of months: breaking rock, moving rock, and stacking rock. Fencing in the West, as the drunk so eloquently put it whenever he could. Joshua did not know or care if the drunk knew that Joshua was working for the foreman Franklin, who the drunk called a nigger slave to the white landowners, but Joshua made sure the drunk would remember the black eye he would wake up with the next day. A fond memory in the early light of dawn en route to the quarrying site.

“Can’t break rock all day if you don’t get ‘round the quarry by dawn, fellas.”, Franklin shouted from the bench of the buggy as he worked the team of horses to drive the team of men.

It was Joshua, the quarryman, Franklin, the foreman, and Earl, the mason. A team of three running rock for the foreseeable at the request of The Governor, climbing out of the valley, when they came upon the hovel of The Old Indian. And as they passed along the cave, the Old Indian came out to greet the sun, as he tended to do as the team passed, always a look of foreboding on the man’s brow and jaw.

An earned look of angst and despair as he witnessed the lands of his ancestors settled, defiled, and sold. Franklin nodded the way of The Old Indian, which resulted in The Old Indian ignoring the whole team yet again.

As they crested the ridge and arrived at the quarry, The Old Indian below was stoking his fire from the night before and as the sun rose fully above the valley, a line of smoke from the fire cut the rays of sunlight into North and South, and cut the quarry in half as well. Joshua jumped out of the back of the buggy as Franklin pulled the team to a stop and applied the handbrake.

Earl followed Joshua down to the ground and they began the labor of loading stone from the day before. Joshua had quarried more stone than the three could load, move, and stack in a day, and this is the way Franklin had directed him. Keep a large inventory quarried so as to keep the process moving smoothly. And on the day progressed as Franklin hauled Earl to the end of the wall where the work would proceed. Joshua was left to his own devices in the quarry.

“He’s the lazy one, Boss.” Joshua quipped about Earl as the loaded buggy pulled away from the quarry, drawing a grin from each man.

The mechanism lays in wait.

The day carried forth, as they tend to do, and Joshua was sweating through his covers, leaving drops of himself on the sledge, picks, pry-bars, and loosened stones. From time to time Franklin would return atop the buggy and the two would load it down with more stone for Earl to stack. While the process was laborious, from the beginning of the work day to the end, their progress was evident in the dwindling stock piles of stone and the progression of the line of wall along the ridge.

While this work was at the behest of The Governor, this particular wall was being built for a local rancher who had commissioned the wall from the state. Politics aside, there was money to be made by all involved both in the short- and long-terms, regardless of the unforeseen cost.

“Good work if you can find it.” Franklin insisted.

“Sure.” Joshua’s reply.

By the time the sun began to set, Joshua had quarried enough stone for the rest of the week's worth of wall. As the sun began to drop into the West, Joshua was pounding away on the ridge, a pace neither of his colleagues could have matched. In the moment he was without thought, physically exhausting himself to the point where the process of lifting and driving the sledge or pick, working the pry-bar, or lifting a loose stone became completely natural.

Much like harvesting crops, after the first hour or so of routine his mind would simply go blank and his actions became second nature. No need to decipher between this decision or that decision, he simply acted on instinct. Over a long enough time instinct becomes nature, or perhaps nature is instinct. He was simply doing that which came naturally.

They had perhaps a few hours of daylight left to burn when Joshua suddenly felt as if he were being watched. Pausing after dropping something close to a boulder in the inventory pile, he scanned the horizon, realizing suddenly that The Old Indian had been looking upon him perhaps for some time.

Joshua could not make out the veteran’s expression, just comprehended his figure staring in Joshua’s direction from across the quarrying site on a slight ridge near the trail down into town. The Old Indian could have been there for hours the way Joshua had been laboring away unimposed. Out of habit Joshua waved, and The Old Indian did not acknowledge the salutation. Uneasy now, Joshua returned to the task at hand, ignoring any feeling this situation created.

“Old Indian been watching you all day.” Franklin announced as he returned for what would be the last load of the day.

“Yeah, kinda odd.” Joshua admitted.

“You’d have thought he’d seen it all. What’s he care about you breaking rock for?” Franklin inquired.

“Hard to say.” Joshua admitted.

When Franklin left for the last time, The Old Indian was nowhere to be seen. Joshua liked the pre-twilight time of day. There was almost a guarantee in these couple of hours that his labor would be relieved for the night, he had earned his reprieve once again. But as he brought the sledge down for the last time, his labors would prove to change the course of things for good. The sledge caught the lip of a large run of stone and cracked the boulder right down the center in a most unnatural manner. Without knowing it, Joshua was now altering everything in driving a sliver down into the center of it all.

He had to scramble to avoid the near half of the boulder settling upon his boots. As he recovered and returned to the cleaved boulder, there beneath lay something he had never seen and would never understand. A red material shone through the crack of the two halves of the yellowish boulder. He propped the pry-bar betwixt the halves and heaved, driving the halves fully apart and revealing what at first appeared to be a gravestone for all of the markings etched into the red surface.

Upon further review, this red slab appeared to be granite, but not of a color native to this land. There appeared to be words chiseled into the surface, only in a language Joshua could not decipher or even recognize. With a bit of further effort he pushed both halves of the boulder off of the slab below completely. He had only a few moments alone with this slab and his confusion with regard to it, as only briefly after revealing the red item Franklin and Earl arrived to head back to town and their camp for the evening.

Without a word the two colleagues understood something was the matter as it was not like Joshua to stop working before their arrival. They dropped off each side of the buggy and joined Joshua as he leaned above the slab. As the sun set, these men observed an ancient ritual without any awareness of the fruits of the labor they would soon undertake.

“Damned red thing.” Earl stated.

“Odd indeed.” Franklin concurred.

“Can’t seem to make out where it would have come from, how it could have gotten here, or what the hell it says.” Joshua revealed.

“Well, gonna have to crack it up if we want to add it to the wall. Hell, prolly couldn’t even lift it for the size of it.” Earl concluded.

And at that, Earl grabbed Joshua’s sledge and brought it down with such force as to send a shudder through his arms. But the slab did not budge, cleave, or even scratch; the markings were still clearly visible.

“I don’t break rock.” Earl confessed.

“Let me give it a go.” and Franklin took the sledge to the slab now, and again, and again, with no further result than Earl’s attempt. “Damn, Joshua you give it a shot yet?”

“Nah, didn’t think it appropriate with how odd the thing looks.” Joshua now confessed. And Franklin handed him the sledge to make an attempt of his own.

Down Joshua brought the hammer. Nothing happened. Joshua looked at the two men uneasily, he was not used to failing to make a change and they had never seen a stone Joshua could not crack. You see, Earl was small but nimble. Franklin was wise, large, and seasoned. Joshua, however, was the largest and most determined. Each man took their tasks per their abilities. It was now fully twilight as the two smaller men watched the biggest of the colleagues bring the sledge down a second time and learn that he was not as strong as he believed a few moments prior.

It was neither in Joshua’s nature to fail or to simply walk away, and the curiosity of each man would not let him leave before they understood what was afoot. And they would soon learn something, just not all. The air was changing with the smell of rain being blown across the ridge now. A storm approached. With the third blow downward from Joshua, a great thud gave way to a deep revert crack upward through the slab. Lightning struck a tree on the next rise miles away. The force of the crack reverberated through the soul of each man standing over the slab. They each picked up a piece of the red thing, dropped it to the pile, and climbed aboard the buggy to beat the storm down the fall back to camp.

The coil is sprung.

As they came down from the ridgeline, there was no fire at The Old Indian’s hovel. An odd realization for each man to see no flame, as they would have expected the hovel’s inhabitant to want his dinner before the storm hit. They rolled forward as the thunder of lightning drew closer. By the time the three reached town atop the buggy, they had decided to park the buggy by the tents, relieve the team of horses to the corral, and adjourn to the saloon for the duration of the storm. Joshua stopped by the trough and washed the soot, soil, and sweat from his face and hands. He would catch up with his associates.

Pulling his face from the water, he rubbed his great mitts together and shook the grimy liquid from his form. He felt refreshed and thought now of the meal Franklin had certainly ordered for him, which would await his arrival at whichever table they secured. But the wind felt new, stirred, intimidating. As the first sprinkles dropped upon Joshua, he felt the energy of the whole valley vibrating around him. Just a spark in the air different from the days and nights before. Something had been brewing, it felt, and could perhaps be roiling over the valley.

The first spark of lightning to hit the valley cast shadows and light. Joshua picked up his pace and entered the light of the saloon. He took his seat sheepishly in the new feel of the valley, taking to his dinner without a word. And then the drunk started in. He said this, he said that, and Joshua kept his mouth shut, save the shoveling of food down his throat. Joshua did not notice but Franklin had set his fork down and pushed his food away, apparently losing his appetite.

“Maybe that damn drunk should have his mouth shut again.” Earl muttered almost to himself, and pushed his own plate away.

“He tries to call me any names again and that’s exactly what’ll happen.” Franklin added.

Joshua kept his head down.

“Damned capitalist pigs running their fences across our prairie! We didn’t settle here to be fenced in, damnit!”

“Shut the hell up.” Franklin and Earl in unison. Joshua stared at his plate.

“You go straight to hell, nigger. And take your redheaded friend with you!” the drunk responded.

At that, Franklin and Earl pushed away from their table and stood to their feet. As they approached the drunk, Joshua kept his seat. Everyone in the saloon stopped what they were doing. The ladies from upstairs stopped their banter with the clientele and looked down into the bar. The bartender set the glass he was polishing upon the bar and reached for something below it. The pianist stopped playing. A man who seemed to be affiliated with the drunk, chaw resin sliding down his chin, hocked into a spittoon and stood at attention.

“You wanna repeat that?” Franklin queried as he and Earl approached the drunk.

“I said you three and your damned fencing can go straight to hell, nigger.” the drunk retorted.

And the man next to the drunk pulled a revolver, aimed down drunkenly along the site and opened fire wildly. Franklin fell, Earl fell, and the bartender leveled a sawed-off he had drawn from under the bar and discharged straight into the drunk and his associate. With the clearing of the smoke, Earl crawled to Franklin, who was still breathing and bleeding from the thigh.

“Damn drunk, that’s what you get!” Earl shouted. “You alright, Boss?”

“His whole head’s done gone. I think I’ll be fine if I can get the bleeding stopped.” Franklin replied.

The drunk and his associate were no more. As Franklin and Earl stood to their feet, looks of shock washed across their faces. Lightning struck, women shouted, and the pianist ran out through the front door. Joshua lay face down in his plate, blood gushing from the back of his head. Then it happened. The whole earth began to vibrate. The rain ceased immediately. And the fires of the lamps flickered as their reservoirs of oil wobbled with the frame of the saloon. Three stallions whinnied and fled down the street and out of the valley. A painting fell off the wall. No one knew what to do in the event of an earthquake. They were not natural in this part of the plains. The earth rumbled for minutes, as if the shaking would never end. A few men scattered after the pianist out the door. As Franklin and Earl made their way to Joshua, they came to realize he too was no more. They would need a new quarry man, that much was for sure. And then the quake stopped.

The mechanism is engaged.