"You don't mean to say that you acted as you say these men are going to act?"
"Shewer!"
"Well, I shouldn't think you'd be very proud of it."
"I have me rights," he declared, flaring up. "What kind av a man is it that'll let himself be waalked on? There's no sinse in it. It's naht natchral. It's naht intinded that it should be so."
"Very well," I said, smoothing the whole thing over, and so that ended.
Well, the masons came, and a fine lot of pirates they surely were. Such independence! Such defiance! Such feverish punctilio in regard to their rights and what forms and procedures they were entitled to! I stared in amazement. For the most part they were hale, healthy, industrious looking creatures, but so obstreperously conscious of their own rights, and so proud of their skill as masons, that there was no living with them. Really, they would have tried the patience of a saint, let alone a healthy, contentious Irish foreman-mason. "First off," as the railroad men used to say, they wanted to know whether there were any non-union men on the job, and if so, would they be discharged instanter?—if not, no work—a situation which gave Rourke several splendid opportunities for altercations, which he hastened to improve, although the non-union men went, of course. Then they wanted to know when, where, and how they were to get their money, whether on demand at any time they chose, and this led to more trouble, since the railroad paid only once a month. However, this was adjusted by a special arrangement being made whereby the building department stood ready to pay them instantly on demand, only I had to run down to the division office each time and get their pay for them at any time that they came to ask for it! Then came an argument (or many of them) as to the number of bricks they were to lay an hour; the number of men they were to carry on one line, or wall; the length of time they were supposed to work, or had worked, or would work—all of which was pure food and drink to Rourke. He was in his element at last, shouting, gesticulating, demanding that they leave or go to——. After all these things had been adjusted, however, they finally consented to go to work, and then of course the work flew. It was a grand scene, really inspiring—forty or fifty masons on the line, perhaps half as many helpers or mixers, the Italians carrying bricks, and a score of carpenters now arriving under another foreman to set the beams and lay the joists as the walls rose upward.
Rourke was about all the time now, arguing and gesticulating with this man or that, fighting with this one or the other, and calling always to some mason or other to "come down" and get his "time." "Come down! Come down!" I would hear, and then would see him rushing for the office, a defiant and even threatening mason at his heels; Rourke demanding that I make out a time-check at once for the latter and go down to the "ahffice" and get the money, the while the mason hung about attempting to seduce other men to a similar point of view. Once in a while, but only on rare occasions, Rourke would patch up a truce with a man. As a rule, the mason was only too eager to leave and spend the money thus far earned, while Rourke was curiously indifferent as to whether he went or stayed. "'Tis to drink he waants," he would declare amusedly. To me it was all like a scene out of comic opera.
Toward the last, however, a natural calm set in, the result no doubt of weariness and a sense of surfeit, which sent the building forward apace. During this time Rourke was to be seen walking defiantly up and down the upper scaffolding of the steadily rising walls, or down below on the ground in front of his men, his hands behind his back, his face screwed into a quizzical expression, his whole body bearing a look of bristling content and pugnacity which was too delicious for words. Since things were going especially well he could not say much, but still he could look his contentiousness, and did. Even now he would occasionally manage to pick a quarrel with some lusty mason or other, which resulted in the customary descent to the office, but not often.
But one cold December day, about three weeks later, when I was just about to announce that I could no longer delay my departure, seeing that my health was now as good, or nearly so, as my purse was lean, and that, whether I would or no, I must arrange to make more money, that a most dreadful accident occurred. It appeared that Rourke and a number of Italians, including Matt and Jimmie, were down in the main room of the building, now fast nearing completion, when the boiler of the hoisting engine, which had been placed inside the building and just at the juncture of three walls, blew up and knocked out this wall and the joists of the second and third floors loose, thus precipitating all of fifteen thousand bricks, which had been placed on the third floor, into this room below. For a few moments there had been a veritable hurricane of bricks and falling timber; and then, when it was over, it was found that the mighty Rourke and five Italians were embedded in or under them, and all but Jimmie more or less seriously injured or killed. Two Italians were killed outright. A third died later. Rourke, in particular, was unfortunately placed and terribly injured. His body from the waist down was completely buried by a pile of bricks, and across his shoulder lay a great joist pressing where it had struck him, and cutting his neck and ear. He was a pathetic sight when we entered, bleeding and pain-wrenched yet grim and undaunted, as one might have expected.
"I'm tight fast, me lad," he said when he could speak. "It's me legs that's caught, not me body. But give a hand to the min, there. The Eyetalians are underneath."