“And listen,” continued Joe, pleased to see that Wayne was interested, “the gayest that happened was about old Isidore, the Jew ole-clothes man, who had a row with the rabbi. He had it in for the rabbi good and strong and he got a pair of pig’s feet and slipped ’em under the rabbi’s chair in the synagogue, which was against the religion, and oh, my, some of the members of that church got after Isidore and was goin’ to make ’im into a burnt sacrifice all right. But Father Jim hid ’im in the cellar at the parish house and went to square it with the rabbi. You might think, them not bein’ members of the same church, and viewin’ matters quite different, they’d give each other the razzle; but Father Jim umpired the row all right and Isidore buys his meat at the kosher shop now, which is proper, Father Jim says, him bein’ a Jew, which is a great race, he says. Shall I crank the buzz wagon?”
Guided by a pillar of cloud that wavered against the stars of the keen, autumn night, the motor sped on toward Ironstead. The black pall was lighted fitfully by fierce gusts of flame; golden showers of sparks rose ceaselessly, fountain-like, and gave a glory and charm to the scene. At one point there fell on Wayne’s ears the mighty cymbal-crash of hammers, now ringing clear and resonant, and lost again in a moment in other tumults of the valley. The spectacle, the sounds, spoke with a new language to his imagination. Here was the most stupendous thing in the world, this forging of the power of the hills into implements and structures and weapons for man’s use. The steel frames of towering buildings, the ribs of swift ships, the needle that sews the finest seam—these were all born of this uproar.
Wayne stood up in the motor to peer upon figures that moved about in a glare of flame as though on a great stage set for a fantastic drama. He knew the practical side of these smelting and forging and riveting processes; but it suited his mood to-night to think of them as part of some tremendous phantasmagoria. He singled out one dark Titan as the chief actor, and named him Vulcan; and these were his slaves, these shadowy shapes that swung the brimming crucibles on huge cranes or manipulated with ease the long glowing bars that might have been the prop and stay of some fiery-hearted Ætna. What could it all mean to these hurrying, leaping men, the discordant hymn of the hammers, the terrible heat, the infernal beat and clash, the nerve-wracking cry of the saws as they severed the hot bars, the venomous, serpent-like hissing that marked the last protest of the rebellious ore against these tyrants who had wrested it from earth’s jealous treasuries.
And Joe, sitting unmoved, with his hands upon the wheel, turned to see why his master delayed. Wayne crouched in the open door of the tonneau, his broad shoulders filling the opening, his cap on the back of his head, gazing upon a spectacle with which he had been familiar from childhood; but to-night it took new hold of him. To these “singed and scorched” beings, the shadows against the flame, Jim Paddock was giving his life.
“Go on, Joe!” he shouted, and slammed the door.
CHAPTER XIII
JEAN MORLEY
THE parish house of St. Luke’s was a remodeled two-story business block adjoining the frame church. One of the store-rooms had been cut in two, half of it serving as a reading-room for men; the rest of it was used as a crèche where young children were looked after at hours when their mothers were too busy to care for them. The other half of the building served as an assembly room on occasions and here the exercises of the evening were already in progress when Wayne arrived. At one end of the room a ring had been improvised and within the roped enclosure a string quartet was playing a waltz to which the feet of a considerable portion of the audience kept time. The place was packed and Wayne stood until the end of the number sandwiched between two labourers who had paused on their way home. Their faces were still grimy; their dinner-pails rubbed Wayne’s legs democratically. A prestidigitator followed the quartet with a series of sleight-of-hand tricks. He was a young Italian and was warmly applauded by representatives of his race in the audience. A young woman sang a popular ballad, the pastoral note of whose refrain, “In the woodland, by the river, I await my love, my own,” was plaintively incongruous in the place.
Wayne was aware of an undercurrent of excitement, especially among the men and boys. They were on their good behaviour, but the tameness of the programme had begun to cloy. A recitation by a girl in pale blue, who stood in painful embarrassment for several minutes while her memory teased her afar off with forgotten rhymes, elicited a few mutterings of disapproval. Someone on the back benches cried, during a long and seemingly endless pause, “Where did you lose it, Minnie?” whereat she withdrew in tearful confusion, followed by sympathetic applause. A scuffle in the rear caused general disorder and drew attention away from the platform. The brother of the recitationist was, it seemed, trying to punch the head of the culprit who had mocked her. Wayne had so far seen nothing of Paddock, but the minister now rose near the scene of conflict and with a quiet word subdued the belligerents. A young man, in a necktie of violent green, who appeared to be the master of ceremonies, leaped to the stage and called for order. He announced that the literary and musical numbers were concluded. “If the gents back there wot wants to fight will ca’m theirselves, we’ll give ’em a few points on how it’s done by real scrappers. The evenin’s stunts will close with five rounds between Jim Balinski of Altoona, and Mike, the motorman. You fellas that want to be noisy better get out now or be chased out.”
A wild cheer, punctuated by cat-calls, greeted the two boxers, as, clad in tights, they stepped nimbly into the roped enclosure and saluted the admiring audience. A howl of “Kill the Irishman” from a violent partisan was drowned in groans and shrieks of “Put him out” in four languages. At this moment Paddock appeared, divested of his coat and waistcoat, gave a hitch to his belt, amid cheers, examined the gloves of the combatants and admonished them as to the rules. Wayne noted with interest that Joe, his chauffeur, was time-keeper, with a dish-pan and stick for gong. A hush fell upon the crowd as the men warily began feeling of each other. The round ended in lively sparring without apparent advantage to either man. The Irishman was, Wayne learned from one of his neighbours, a member of Paddock’s own class in boxing at the parish house and sentiment seemed to favour him. The second round was marked by clever foot-work by the Irishman, who walked round the Altoona visitor to the delight of the spectators. In the third and fourth rounds the Irishman continued to play with his antagonist, who doggedly sought an opening for a heavy blow. He landed heavily with his right several times, but the Irishman’s nimbleness saved him from damage. In mere cleverness, the local man was the better boxer, a fact which was clear enough to his adversary, who held back and waited for an opportunity to break through the Irishman’s ready guard with a telling blow. The strategic moment came when, in the last round, the Irishman jumped away after raining half a dozen blows on the enemy’s head, and grinned his satisfaction amid laughter and howls of delight. In his joy of the situation he made a gesture that indicated his complete confidence in the fortune of battle to his friends in the crowd, and his insolence was promptly rewarded by a telling clip in the face that brought him blinking to his knees.
He came to time, however, with rage in his eyes. Several women shrieked at the sight of his blood-smeared nose and there was a slight commotion as a girl near the door was led out to faint. “Kill ’im, Mike!” roared a dozen voices. “You’re all right, Altoona!” yelled a lone supporter of the visitor. They clinched, but the Altoona man flung off the Irishman with ease. “Knock ’im out, Mike!” chorused the motorman’s friends. The Irishman feinted elaborately, but his antagonist sullenly maintained his guard and waited. The time was short in which to achieve victory, but he had saved himself for a supreme effort. The Irishman hit him a smart clip on the chin that staggered him for a moment, and then the man from Altoona drew back and gathered himself together. He swung his arm high, as though it had been a hammer, and the Irishman cowered under it, slipped as he side-stepped and the Altoona man, striking out wildly, landed in a heap with his knees in the Irishman’s face.