Chapter 21: Dan

The shrill whistle that at noon had obtruded its discord into Nance Molloy’s thoughts had a very different effect on Dan Lewis, washing his hands under the hydrant in the factory yard. He had not forgotten that it was Saturday. Neither had Growler, who stood watching him with an oblique look in his old eye that said as plain as words that he knew what momentous business was brewing at five o’clock.

It was not only Saturday for Dan, but the most important Saturday that ever figured on the calendar. In his heroic efforts to conform to Mrs. Purdy’s standard of perfection he had studied the advice to young men in the “Sunday Echo.” There he learned that no gentleman would think of mentioning love to a young lady until he was in a position to marry her. To-day’s pay envelope would hold the exact amount to bring his bank account up to the three imposing figures that he had decided on as the minimum sum to be put away.

As he was drying his hands on his handkerchief and whistling softly under his breath, he was summoned to the office.

For the past year he had been a self-constituted buffer between Mr. Clarke and the men in the furnace-room, and he wondered anxiously what new complication had arisen.

“He’s got an awful grouch on,” warned the stenographer as Dan passed through the outer office.

Mr. Clarke was sitting at his desk, tapping his foot impatiently.

“Well, Lewis,” he said, “you’ve taken your time! Sit down. I want to talk to you.”

Dan dropped into the chair opposite and waited.

“Is it true that you have been doing most of the new foreman’s work for the past month?”

“Well, I’ve helped him some. You see, being here so long, I know the ropes a bit better than he does.”

“That’s not the point. I ought to have known sooner that he could not handle the job. I fired him this morning, and we’ve got to make some temporary arrangement until a new man is installed.”

Dan’s face grew grave.

“We can manage everything but the finishing room. Some of the girls have been threatening to quit.”

“What’s the grievance now?”

“Same thing—ventilation. Two more girls fainted there this morning. The air is something terrible.”

“What do they think I am running?” demanded Mr. Clarke, angrily, “a health resort?”

“No, sir,” said Dan, “a death trap.”

Mr. Clarke set his jaw and glared at Dan, but he said nothing. The doctor’s recent verdict on the death of a certain one-eyed girl, named Mag Gist, may have had something to do with his silence.

“How many girls are in that room now?” he asked after a long pause.

Dan gave the number, together with several other disturbing facts concerning the sanitary arrangements.

“Well, what’s to be done?” demanded Mr. Clarke, fiercely. “We can’t get out the work with fewer girls, and there is no way of enlarging that room.”

“Yes, sir, there is,” said Dan. “Would you mind me showing you a way?”

“Since you are so full of advice, go ahead.”

With crude, but sure, pencil strokes, Dan got his ideas on paper. He had done it so often for his own satisfaction that he could have made them with his eyes shut. Ever since those early days when he had seen that room through Nance Molloy’s eyes, he had persisted in his efforts to better it.

Mr. Clarke, with his fingers thrust through his scanty hair, watched him scornfully.

“Absolutely impractical,” he declared. “The only feasible plan would be to take out the north partition and build an extension like this.”

“That couldn’t be done,” said Dan, “on account of the projection.”

Whereupon, such is the power of opposition, Mr. Clarke set himself to prove that it could. For over an hour they wrangled, going into the questions of cost, of time, of heating, of ventilation, scarcely looking up from the plans until a figure in a checked suit flung open the door, letting in a draught of air that scattered the papers on the desk.

“Hello, Dad,” said the new-comer, with a friendly nod to Dan, “I’m sorry to disturb you, but I only have a minute.”