Sometimes Mr. Driscoll forgot his principle. While Pete was nonchalantly loosening the sling, leaning out over the street, nothing between him and the pavement but the grip of his legs, there was something very like a look of admiration in Mr. Driscoll's aggravating eyes. He moved over to Pete just as the latter was pulling on his slouch hat.
"I get a shiver every time I see a man do that," he said.
"That? That's nothin'," said Pete. "I'd a heap ruther do that than work down in the street. Down in the street, why, who knows when a brick's agoin' to fall on your head!"
"Um!" Mr. Driscoll remembered himself and his eyes clicked. He turned from Pete, and called to the young foreman: "I'll look at the riveters now."
There came toward Tom a little, stocky man, commonly known as "Rivet Head." Someone had noted the likeness of his cranium to a newly-hammered rivet, and the nickname had stuck.
"Get the other four columns up out of the street before setting any more," Tom ordered, and then walked with Mr. Driscoll to where the head of a ladder stuck up through the flooring.
Pete, with a sour look, watched Mr. Driscoll's round body awkwardly disappear down the ladder.
"Boys, if I was a preacher, I know how I'd run my business," he remarked.
"How, Pete?" queried one of the gang.