"We are the company. While Mr. Farley is away we're the bosses; what we say, goes."
"All right," Ludlow went on. "That's a little better. But we've got a kick or two comin'. Is this half-pay goin' to be in orders on the company's store?"
"I said cash," said Tom briefly.
"Good enough. But I s'pose we'd have to spend it at the company's store, jest the same, 'r get fired."
"No!"—emphatically. "I'm not even sure that we should reopen the store. We shall not reopen it unless you men want it. If you do want it, we'll make it strictly coöperative, dividing the profits with every employee according to his purchases."
"Well, by gol, that's white, anyway," commented one of the coke burners. "Be a mighty col' day in July when old man Farley'd talk as straight as that."
"Ag'in," said Ludlow, "what's this half-pay to be figured on—the reg'lar scale?"
"Of course."
"And what security do we have that t'other half 'll be paid, some time?"
"My father's word, and mine."