2
Winthrop was standing at the small furnace in the box-lined passage way. It was roaring its loudest. Through its open door the red light fell sharply on his pink-flushed face and drooping fair moustache and poured down over his white apron. “Good ph-morning” he said pleasantly, his eye on the heart of the furnace, his foot briskly pumping the blower. From the body of the room came sounds of tapping and whistling ... the noise of the furnace prevented their knowing that anyone had come in.... Miriam drew near to the furnace, relieved at the shortness of her excursion. She stared at the tiny shape blazing red-gold at the heart of the glare. Winthrop gathered up a pair of tongs and drew the mould from the little square of light. The air hissed from the bellows and the roaring of the flames died down. In a moment he was standing free with hot face and hot patient ironic eyes, gently taking the denture from her hands. “Good morning” said Miriam, “Oh, Mr. Winthrop, it’s a repair for Mr. Orly. It’s urgent. Can you manage it?” “It’s ph—ph—sure to be urgent” said Winthrop examining the denture with a short-sighted frown. Miriam waited anxiously. The hammering and whistling had ceased. “It’ll be all right, Miss Ph-Henderson” said Winthrop encouragingly. She turned to the door. The clamps.... Gathering herself together she went down the passage and stood at the head of the two stone steps leading down into the body of the room. A swift scrubbing of emery paper on metal was going on at the end of the long bench, lit by a long sky-light, from which the four faces looked up at her with a chorus of good mornings in response to her greeting. “Are Mr. Hancock’s clamps ready?” she asked diffidently. “Jimmy ...” The figure nearest to her glanced down the row of seated forms. The small bullet-headed boy at the end of the bench scrubbed vigorously and ironically with his emery stick. “He won’t be a minute, Miss Henderson” said the near pupil comfortingly.
Miriam observed his spruce grey suit curiously masked by the mechanic’s apron, the quiet controlled amused face, and felt the burden of her little attack as part of the patient prolonged boredom of his pupillage. The second pupil, sitting next to him kept dog-like sympathetic eyes on her face, waiting for a glance. She passed him by, smiling gently in response without looking at him while her eyes rested upon the form of the junior mechanic whose head was turned in the direction of the scrubbing boy. The head was refined, thin and clear cut, thatched with glossy curls. Its expression was servile—the brain eagerly seeking some flowery phrase—something to decorate at once the occasion and the speaker, and to give relief to the mouth strained in an arrested obsequious smile. Nothing came and the clever meticulous hands were idle on the board. It seemed absurd to say that Mr. Hancock was waiting for the clamps while Jimmy was scrubbing so busily. But they had obviously been forgotten. She fidgeted.
“Will somebody send them up when they’re done?”
“Jimmy, you’re a miserable sinner, hurry up” said the senior pupil.
“They’re done” said Jimmy in a cracked bass voice. “Thank goodness” breathed Miriam, dimpling. Jimmy came round and scattered the clamps carefully into her outstretched hand, with down-cast eyes and a crisp dimpling smile.
“Rule Britannia,” remarked the junior pupil, resuming his work as Miriam turned away and hurried along the passage and through the door held open for her by Winthrop. She flew up to Mr. Hancock’s room three steps at a time, tapped gently at the door and went in. He came forward across the soft grey green carpet to take the clamps and murmured gently “Have you got my carbolic?”