“Looks as if it was clearing up,” he remarked.
“What are you going to do?” asked Nellie Stone again, with a coquettish flirt of her blond fluff of hair.
“Grin and bear it, I s'pose,” replied the young laster, with an adoring look at her.
“My land! grin and bear a cut of ten per cent.? Well, I don't think you've got much spunk, I must say. Why don't you strike?”
“Who's going to feed us?” replied the laster, in a tender voice.
“Feed you? Oh, you don't want much to eat. Join the union. It's ridiculous so few of the men in Lloyd's belong to it, anyway; and then the union will feed you, won't it?”
“The union did not do what it promised in the Scarboro strike,” interposed Dennison, curtly.
“Oh, we all know where you are, Frank Dennison,” said the girl, with a soft roll of her blue eyes. “Besides, it's easy to talk when you aren't hit. Your wages aren't cut. But here is George May here, he's in a different box.”
“He's got nobody dependent on him, anyway,” said Flynn.
“If I wasn't going to get married I'd strike,” cried the young man, with a fervent glance at the girl. She colored, half pleased, half angry, and the other men chuckled. She took another bite of pie to conceal her confusion. She preferred Flynn to the laster, and while she was not averse to proving to the former the triumph of her charms over another man, did not like too much concessions.