Читать книгу The Story of Leather - Sara Ware Bassett - Страница 6

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PETER WINS ANOTHER NAME

HE next morning when, at half-past six, the small alarm clock at his bedside shot off with metallic clangor Peter raised himself drowsily on his elbow and glanced about. What had happened? What was all this jangling about? In a second more, however, he recollected. This was the day when school, fun, and friends were to be left behind, and when he was to set forth into a new world. He was going to work! Slowly, unwillingly, with a vague sinking at heart, he dragged himself to his feet and listened. It was very still. All the world appeared to have stopped and the only being alive in the great universe seemed to be himself. He prepared to dress. Half automatically he turned on the shower-bath. The chill of the cold water sent a tingle over him and quickened his awakening faculties. Pulling on his clothes he crept down over the stairs. It was bad enough to have to get up at this unearthly hour himself; he at least need not disturb the rest of the household. Of course his father would get up and start him off.

But to Peter’s surprise nothing of this sort happened. Instead he sat down alone in the big dining-room to a forlorn breakfast, at the conclusion of which the waitress laid on the table beside him a carefully packed lunch-box. Now Peter detested taking a lunch. Whenever he went with his parents on motor trips or train journeys the family always stopped at hotels for their meals or patronized the dining-cars. It seemed such a vulgar thing to open a box and in the gaze of lookers on devour one’s food out of it. Accordingly he eyed the lunch-box with disdain, mentally arguing that although he must, out of gratitude to his mother’s thoughtfulness, carry it, he certainly should not open it. He would far rather go hungry than eat a lunch from a box!

On the porch still another unpleasant feature of this going to work greeted him. No motor-car, panting like a hound on the leash, stood waiting to carry him to the factory. Evidently his father had made no provision for him to get to the tannery. He must walk! So entirely unforeseen was this development that the boy stood a moment irresolute. It was a good mile to the tan yards; he had had no notion of walking, and there was now but scant time in which to cover the distance. Perhaps his father had forgotten to order the car. Peter had half a mind not to go. After all what difference would it make whether he went to-day or to-morrow? In fact, why wasn’t it better to delay until to-morrow when he could be sure of not being late? He vacillated uneasily. Then the thought of what his father would say when he came down to breakfast and found that his son had not gone decided Peter.

Down two steps at a time he dashed and set out over the gravel drive with the even jog of a track sprinter. On he went. Running in the June sunshine was hot work; nevertheless, hat in hand, he kept up the pace. He must be there promptly at eight, his father had told him. He could feel tiny streams of perspiration trickling down his back, and he sensed that his collar was wilting into a limp band of flimsy linen. Still he ran on. Eight was just on the stroke when he presented himself at the office of Factory 1.

A stout man bending over a ledger at a desk near the door eyed the panting lad with disapproval.

“What do you want?” he demanded sharply. “Boys are not admitted in this office.”

“I want to see Mr. Tyler,” gasped Peter.

“Well, you can’t,” the bookkeeper responded acidly. “He’s busy. If you are wanting a job I can tell you right now that there are none to be had. We have more boys already than we know what to do with. You better not wait. It won’t do any good.”

“But I must see Mr. Tyler,” persisted Peter. “My fa—— I was told to give him this card.”

“Why didn’t you say you had a card in the first place?” was the gruff question. “Give it here. You can sit down on that bench and wait.”

As the accountant held out his hand Peter delivered up the card.

“Peter Strong—hump!” read the bookkeeper. “Sent by—oh, you’re sent by Mr. Coddington, are you? Some relative of his, perhaps.”

“Mr. Coddington said I was to present the card to Mr. Tyler,” Peter answered, ignoring the implied query.

“He shall have it right away, Strong. You’ll excuse my brusqueness. I did not understand that you were sent here. We have so many young boys applying for work that we have to pack them off in short order,” explained the man glibly.

It was evident that he was not a little discomfited at the chill reception he had accorded Peter, for he anxiously continued to reiterate excuses and apologies. Fortunately in the midst of his explanations an electric bell beside his desk rang and cut him short.

“That is Mr. Tyler now,” he murmured. “I’ll take in your card right away.”

Peter watched him as he hurried down the center of the long room and disappeared into a little glass cage in the corner.

It was an oblong room in which reigned the din of typewriters. Over against the farther wall a dozen or more men were bending so intently over heavy, leather-bound ledgers that it seemed as if they must have sat in that exact spot from the beginning of the world, adding, adding, adding! Vacantly the lad’s eye wandered along to the space just opposite him where, framed in neat oak, hung a printed notice headed: “Labor Laws of the State of Massachusetts.” For the want of a better amusement Peter sauntered over and began to read. The length of the working day, he gathered, was ten hours except for boys under sixteen, whom the law forbade working longer than eight hours. A smile passed over the lad’s face. Eight hours was surely long enough—from eight until twelve, and from one until five. What if he had been sixteen instead of fifteen, and been forced to get to the tannery at seven o’clock in the morning and work until six at night! There must be boys who did. For the first time in his life Peter was thankful that he was no older.

Just at this moment he saw the bookkeeper returning.

“If you please, Strong,” said the older man with a deference that contrasted markedly with his former greeting, “will you step this way? Mr. Tyler is expecting you.”

Peter followed through the central aisle of the long room and entered the small, glass-enclosed space where a man surrounded by a chaos of papers and letters was sitting at a roll-top desk.

“This, Mr. Tyler, is young Strong,” announced the bookkeeper to the superintendent.

“I am glad to see you, Strong.”

So sharply did his eye sweep over Peter that the boy trembled lest this oracle suddenly announce:

“I know all about you. Your name is not Strong at all. You are Peter Coddington, and you have been sent to the mill because you flunked your examinations.”

Nothing of the sort happened, however. The superintendent merely remarked with a nod: “That will do, Carter. You may go.”

Peter heard the latch click as Mr. Carter went out.

“Well, young man, so you want a job in the tannery?” were Mr. Tyler’s next words.

“Yes, sir.”

“Mr. Coddington telephoned me about you. He told me that you are entirely inexperienced and with no knowledge of the business. I should say the only thing for you to do is to begin at the very bottom of the ladder, if you want to make anything of yourself.”

“I suppose so, sir.”

The superintendent tilted back in his chair and carefully studied the lad before him.

“You look able-bodied.”

“Oh, yes, sir.”

“Not afraid of work?”

Peter hesitated.

“I don’t mind working if I like what I’m doing, sir,” he replied with naive truthfulness.

It was obvious that the honest reply pleased Mr. Tyler.

“I guess that is the way with many of us, Strong,” he laughed. “But if you are to have a position here you will have to stick at your work whether you like it or not.”

“I mean to try to.”

“That’s the proper spirit. You are not afraid of getting your hands dirty?”

Peter laughed contemptuously. Later he remembered that laugh and smiled grimly at his own ignorance.

Mr. Tyler seemed satisfied.

“Well, I can set you to work right away unloading skins,” he said. “We are short-handed and can use a boy to advantage. Are you over sixteen?”

“No, sir, I am fifteen.”

“That’s bad. I don’t like to take these eight-hour boys. The time we want workmen most is in the early morning and at closing time. Those are the very hours you under-age fellows are not here. However, since you have come at Mr. Coddington’s recommendation we’ll have to get on without you the best way we can. Strong, your name is! Do you know Mr. Coddington personally?”

“I’ve known him all my life,” was the reply.

“Then you know an honest, upright gentleman,” declared Mr. Tyler warmly. “His friendship is well worth having and a possession to be proud of. Take care you do not disappoint him.”

“I do not mean to disappoint him,” was Peter’s quick reply. “He told me, though, that after he got me the place he should not do anything more for me. I’ve got to make good myself. He’s the president of the company and I am just a boy in the works.”

Unconsciously the lad repeated his father’s very words.

“That’s right. That’s the way to go at it,” the superintendent assented cordially. “It is very kind of Mr. Coddington to bother his head about you at all, for he is such a busy man that he has more things to remember in a day than most of the rest of us have ever thought of in all our lives. After you once get in here he, of course, can’t take the time to follow you up. Having done you the favor of giving you a start he will drop you from his mind. You cannot expect anything else and I am glad you have common sense enough to see it.”

At the thought of his father “dropping him from his mind” Peter smiled inwardly. Of course Mr. Tyler could not see the smile, and even if he had he would not have understood it. As it was he now cut short the interview by touching a bell at his elbow in response to which a messenger appeared.

“Take this boy down to the yard, Johnson,” he said. “Introduce him to Carmachel and tell him he is to help unload skins. His name is Strong. Good luck to you, young man. Remember the world is a large place and there are plenty of fine positions waiting for the men who prove themselves big enough to fill them.”

Peter took the superintendent’s hand but he forgot to answer. Somehow Mr. Tyler’s words awakened a train of thoughts which were so entirely new that he could not immediately drive them from his mind. So the great universe of work demanded that you should fill your position, not rattle round in it! The mere fact that one had a rich father did not help much then after all. It might aid you in keeping your job, to be sure, but it could not aid you in doing it. Evidently at the Coddington tanneries there were plenty of men ready to take your chance if you were not smart enough to hold on to it yourself. Peter decided that it behooved him to “hustle.” It was a novel sensation to feel this spur to action.

As he thus philosophized he was following his guide, who now turned down a flight of steep steps into a yard slippery with black mud and deeply rutted by the wheels of heavy wagons. A double track with a row of freight cars flanked the building opposite, and from these cars a group of men were unloading bundles of skins and tossing them on the platform. The men were dressed in faded jumpers and overalls and some of them wore rubber aprons.

They glanced up an instant as Peter drew near.

“Carmachel,” called the man who was showing the way, “this young fellow is to help at unloading and later, the boss says, he is to watch you fellows sort skins. He is a green lad and,” added the messenger with a grin of enjoyment at some joke that Peter did not at all comprehend, “his name is Strong.”

Carmachel, a grizzled Irishman, looked up—a twinkle in his eye.

“It’s Strong he’ll have to be if he is to work here,” he answered with a chuckle in which the others joined. “I say, young one,” he continued kindly, “you’re not figuring on unloading skins in those clothes, are you?”

“I was,” replied Peter, nodding.

“Well, before you begin, you better have another think. It will be the end of your glad rags. It’s truth I’m tellin’ you. Step inside the doorway and wriggle yourself into those brown jeans you’ll see hangin’ there.”

Peter went in.

He took down the jeans from a peg behind the door. The clothes were dirty, sticky with salt, and in them lingered a loathsome aroma of wet hides. Instinctively he shrank from touching them. Then, gritting his teeth, he put them on. This he did more out of appreciation for the rough kindliness of the old Irishman than because he feared to injure his clothes; his father would give him plenty more suits if that one was spoiled.

When he went out on the platform Carmachel eyed him.

“That’s more like it,” he said. “Now get busy. We want to pull these cars out of the yard by noon. Step lively.”

Peter crossed the wet, slippery platform to the car where the other men were working. The skins were folded neatly and tied with stout cord. He lifted the bundle nearest at hand, then dropped it. It was solid, sticky, and damp.

“They’re wet!” he exclaimed.

“For certain they’re wet!” roared the Irishman with a noisy guffaw. “You’re as green as the skins themselves—greener, for you are not even salted.”

The gang on the platform shouted at the joke.

Peter’s anger rose, but he struggled to take their chaffing in good part.

“You see, I don’t know a thing about all this business,” confessed he, frankly. “You fellows who do will have to tell me.”

The answer struck the right note with the men.

“How could you be expected to know, sonny?” called a red-faced Swede kindly. “Every boy who comes into the tannery has to learn.”

“Pitch a few skins out of the car, lad, while I tell you some things,” broke in Carmachel. “You are unloading calfskins; that’s the only kind we tan at Factory 1. Over at Factory 2 they tan sheepskins, and at Factory 3 cowhides. In each of these factories the skins are treated and prepared for the trade quite differently, as you will learn by and by if you have the chance to go through the other buildings. These calfskins that we are unloading came from the Chicago slaughter-houses, where as soon as they were taken off the animals they were salted; folded with the head, tail, and small parts inside; tied in bales such as you see; and shipped. They are what we call green-salted. We also get green-salted skins from the abattoirs of the city of Paris, and from lots of other places, too. Sometimes, though, skins are salted green and are then dried like those you saw piled up in the shed; those we call dry-salted. They came from Norway, Sweden, and South America. Then we have dry hides which are dried without being salted at all. Remember now—green-salted, dry-salted, and dry.”

Peter repeated the terms.

At the same time he did his share in tossing the heavy bales of moist skins to the platform. It was strenuous work. Before an hour was up his back and arms ached with the unaccustomed exercise. Tennis and football were as nothing to this! Still he went on uncomplainingly. His unflagging energy appealed to the men.

“Knock off, lad, and rest a bit,” called Carmachel at last. “You’re not toughened to this job as we are. It’s a precious lame back you’ll have to-morrow if you keep at it like this the first time.”

Gratefully Peter straightened up and took a long breath. Then he glanced at his hands.

“You’ll be losing your gentlemanly white hands, if that’s what’s worrying you,” grinned Carmachel, reading his thoughts with disconcerting keenness.

“Oh, I’m not afraid of my hands,” replied Peter, mortified at being detected in such a foolish reflection. “I was just thinking that they are beginning to look the part.”

“If you are aiming to work up through the tannery they’ll likely look the part more by the time you’ve got a few coats of lime and blacking on them,” was Carmachel’s dry response. “Now we’ll let the others finish this work. You come inside and you shall have a new job. You’ve done enough unloading for your first day.”

Obediently Peter followed into the shed, where other men were busy cutting the cords from round the skins, looking them over, and tossing some into one pile and some into another.

“These fellows that you see are sorting the calfskins according to their weight,” explained Carmachel. “We get them flat—by that I mean that when the bales are made up all sizes and qualities of skins are tied in together. These men put the fine, heavy ones in one pile, the medium weight in another, the light weight in another, the imperfect ones in another, and so on.”

“I do not see how they can tell so quickly,” said Peter.

“They couldn’t if they hadn’t done it a good many times before. They are skilled men. Watch them. It does not take them many minutes to determine the value of a skin.”

“And what are those other men doing?” Peter questioned, pointing to a group of workmen who were engaged in swiftly cutting off parts of the skins with long knives.

“Oh, they are taking off the heads and other good-for-nothing parts which are sold for glue stock. Nothing is wasted in a tannery, let me tell you! After the skins leave this room they will be sent to the beamhouse, where they will be soaked in water until all the dirt and salt is out of them. Usually this takes from twenty-four to forty-eight hours.”

“What’s the beamhouse?” was Peter’s query.

“The beamhouse? I’ll not be telling you. ’Twould be a sin to spoil your first sight of it.” Carmachel shook his head. “No, young one, I’ll tell you nothing of the beamhouse. You’ll find out in time. There’s many a pleasant spot awaiting you in this tannery.”

A general snicker went around.

Again Peter did not understand.

“Now,” declared Carmachel briskly, “you have idled long enough. Take that knife and go to cutting the twine from those bales of skins.”

At this task the boy worked faithfully until the noon whistle blew. At its first blast all the men dropped what they were doing and Peter, who did the same, followed them into a washroom, where he scoured his hands with sand soap. Somehow he did not feel as scornful toward his box of lunch as he had when he had tucked it under his arm in the early morning. Instead he made his way out into the vacant field opposite where he saw the men congregating, and sitting down in the shade of one of the factories, lifted the tin cover with keenest anticipation. How good it seemed to rest, and how faint he was! He devoured the food hurriedly with the quick greed of hunger. He then glanced about him. Some boys and men were sauntering with bat and ball out into the open field. Apparently a noontide game was a part of the daily program, for two nines were quickly organized and a match was under way in the twinkling of an eye. The other workmen drew near to watch the play and so did Peter. He wondered how any one could summon energy enough to toss a ball. They couldn’t be as tired as he was! The game began. Before it had proceeded beyond the first inning it was obvious that the teams were unevenly matched.