I had always regarded the humorous paragraphs about the price of coal as mere pleasantries. I now deny that they are pleasantries, and they are far from "mere."
There are several grades of coal. Our furnace takes No. 3, and it's $6.60 a ton, April price. The man who dominates the situation told me by way of consolation that if it hadn't been for the big strike coal would be 50 cents a ton cheaper. I can't see how that sort of consolation helps a fellow.
Our house burns about ten or twelve tons, normal conditions. We figured that about eight tons now would be the proper caper, and we could pay the difference next winter if driven to it. From the way the furnace ate coal to take the chill off the house the first day, I could see the Board of Charities asking me my name, address, age, social condition and whether my parents ever went to jail.
Now $6.60 times eight tons is $52.80, and that's more than taxes, water rent and interest on a house and lot. So when the man backed up with a cartload and began to throw it in off-handedly, I was pained. A coal-heaver should treat $52.80 with more respect. I have seen men throw high-grade ore out of the Independence mine with the same callous indifference, without myself being shocked; but here was a new situation. It was my $52.80 he was throwing around like dirt, and I spoke to him about it.
"How," I said, "can you have the heart to dump $52.80 into my cellar without ceremony? You should at least remove your hat."
Do you know, I don't believe he appreciated the situation.
William made the first fire. I instructed him to lay on the coal as scarcely as possible, and to go slow with the draughts. So he threw on six shovelsful of my $52.80, opened everything and ran it up to 204 degrees F. Any man who sat ten minutes in our house and then dared to expose himself in a Turkish steam room would freeze to death in ten seconds.
We had a fire in the furnace two or three days. I got interested in (a) a newly patented ash sifter (b) and a process for mixing ashes with some chemical solution that would restore a ton of coal for twenty-five cents. If you have never sifted ashes, you've missed something. You take a couple of shovelsful of ashes and dump them in the sifter. Then you pick up the sifter and agitate it. If I were employing an ash sifter, I should get one addicted to chills and ague, or St. Vitus' dance, or something. Then I could be sure he wasn't loafing on the job! Well, after you've shivered the sifter, busted a suspender button, twisted your backbone into a pretzel, filled your eyes, ears, nose, and lungs with dust and cussed your patron saint, you've got the net result: One piece of half-burned coal, six clinkers, and the top of a tin can.
That chemical process to make coal out of ashes for a quarter a ton is a good thing—for the inventor. With childlike confidence I bought a bottle of it. After ruining a barrel of perfectly good ashes and backsliding from the church of Martin Luther I gave it up. Hereafter we will burn our coal as long as it will burn, and the ashes may go hang! I could have earned $50 at my profession in the time I was trying to beat an honest coal dealer out of $6.60.
Well, when we finally got the furnace working I hopped into the shower bath.