“Here is a comrade, mother,” said Otto.
“Welcome,” she said, as she took Pelle’s hand. She held it a moment in her own as she looked at him.
In the living room sat Stolpe, a mason, reading The Working Man. He was in shirt sleeves, and was resting his heavy arms on the table. He read whispering to himself, he had not noticed that a guest was in the room.
“Here’s some one who would like to say how-d’ye-do to father,” said Otto, laying his hand on his father’s arm.
Stolpe raised his head and looked at Pelle. “Perhaps you would like to join the Union?” he asked, rising with difficulty, with one hand pressed on the table. He was tall, his hair was sprinkled with gray; his eyes were mottled from the impact of splinters of limestone.
“You and your Union!” said Madam Stolpe. “Perhaps you think there’s no one in it but you!”
“No, mother; little by little a whole crowd of people have entered it, but all the same I was the first.”
“I’m already in the Union,” said Pelle. “But not in yours. I’m a shoemaker, you know.”
“Shoemaker, ah, that’s a poor trade for a journeyman; but all the same a man can get to be a master; but to-day a mason can’t do that—there’s a great difference there. And if one remains a journeyman all his life long, he has more interest in modifying his position. Do you understand? That’s why the organization of the shoemakers has never been of more than middling dimensions. Another reason is that they work in their own rooms, and one can’t get them together. But now there’s a new man come, who seems to be making things move.”
“Yes, and this is he, father,” said Otto, laughing.