Mrs. Weinstein tried to comfort Yetta.
"Don't listen to them," she said. "You are yet young—you'll be all right—"
She stopped abruptly, for the office door had opened and Jake Goldfogle came out. His ear, trained to the chaotic noise of the shop, had caught the momentary halt.
"Ober, mein Gott, wos is der mer?" he roared.
Mrs. Cohen, who had caught up with her work and was waiting for more, pointed an accusing finger at Yetta.
Jake Goldfogle was twenty-eight. This was his first "shop." The dominant expression of his face—which he tried to cover with an assumption of masterliness—was worry. The person who has been ground by poverty is never a debonaire gambler. But these ignorant, unimaginative women who slaved for him, whom he lashed with his tongue and sometimes struck, did not understand his situation, did not know of the myriad nightmares which haunted his waking as well as his sleeping hours. They bent low over their machines, hurrying under the eye of the master, holding their breath to catch the torrent of abuse they expected to hear fall on Yetta.
They did not realize—least of all did Yetta—that she was an exception. Jake swallowed the curses on his tongue and asked her in a constrained and unfamiliar voice what was wrong.
"Nothing," she said. "A pain in my back."
No sort of pain known to women was considered a valid excuse for breaking speed. She wondered with sullen, servile anger how much he would fine her. If any of the women had looked up, they would have seen strange twists on the boss's face. He turned abruptly, without a word, and went back to his office. He sat down at his desk and looked through the little window, by means of which he could, glancing up from his ledger, spy on the roomful of workers. His eyes rested a moment on Yetta's stooped back. Then, grasping his temples, he paced up and down his dingy office, cursing the day he was born. He was in love with Yetta and could not afford to tell her so.