"
To be sure it does, sir," was the answer. "Your honored father, sir, used to say, 'If changes don't come, make them come. Things aren't getting on without them.'"
"How long can we run, Greenwood?"
"Happen about four hours, sir."
"When the looms give up, send men and women to the lunchroom."
"All right, sir."
Was it all right? If so, had he not been fighting a useless battle and got worsted? But he could not talk with his soul that morning. He could not even think. He sat passive and was dumb because it was evidently God's doing. Perhaps he had been too proud of his long struggle, and it was good spiritual correction for him to go down into the valley of humiliation. Short ejaculatory prayers fell almost unconsciously from his lips, mainly for the poor men and women he must lock out to poverty and suffering.
Finally his being became all hearing. Life appeared to stand still a moment as loom after loom stopped. A sudden total silence followed. It was broken by a long piercing wail as if some woman had been hurt, and in a few minutes Greenwood looked into his office and said, "They be all waiting for you, sir." The man spoke calmly, even cheerfully, and John roused himself and with an assumed air of hopefulness went to speak to his workers.
They were standing together and on every face there was a quiet steadfastness that was very impressive. John went close to them so that he seemed to mingle with them. "Men and women," he said, "I have done my best."
"Thou hes, and we all know it."