Part 128 (1/2)

They were paid big wages and received abundance to eat and to drink. And the working day or s.h.i.+ft was shorter than usual. They did not understand the real significance of this change of life, but went about playing the bally. But there was a peculiar hesitation visible in their faces, as though they were not quite sure of one another. The native workers, who were in the minority, kept to themselves--as though they felt an inward contempt for those fellows who had travelled so far to fish in the troubled waters of their distress.

They were working three s.h.i.+fts, each of eight hours' duration.

”Oho!” thought Pelle, ”why, this, good G.o.d, is the eight-hours' day!

This is surely the State of the future!” At the very moment of his arrival one s.h.i.+ft was completed, and the men immediately proceeded to make the most infernal uproar, hammering on metal and shouting for food and brandy. A huge cauldron full of beef and potatoes was dragged in.

Pelle was told off to join a mess of ten men.

”Eat, matey!” they said. ”Hungry, ain't you? How long had you been out of work before you gave in?”

”Three months,” said Pelle.

”Then you must be peckish. Here with the beef! More beef here!” they cried, to the cook's mate. ”You can keep the potatoes and welcome! We've eaten enough potatoes all our lives!”--”This is Tom Tiddler's land, with b.u.t.ter sauce into the bargain! This is how we've always said it ought to be--good wages and little to do, lots to eat and brandy to drink! Now you can see it was a good thing we held out till it came to this--now we get our reward! Your health! Here, damme, what's your name, you there?”

”Karlsen,” said Pelle.

”Here's to you, Karlsen! Well, and how are things looking outside? Have you seen my wife lately? She's easy to recognize--she's a woman with seven children with nothing inside their ribs! Well, how goes it with the strikers?”

After eating they sat about playing cards, and drinking, or they loafed about and began to quarrel; they were a sharp-tongued crew; they went about actuated by a malicious longing to sting one another. ”Come and have a game with us, mate--and have a drink!” they cried to Pelle. ”d.a.m.n it all, how else should a man kill the time in this infernal place?

Sixteen hours' sleep a day--no, that's more than a chap can do with!”

There was a deafening uproar, as though the place had been a vast tavern, with men shouting and abusing one another; each contributed to the din as though he wanted to drown it by his own voice. They were able to buy drink in the factory, and they drank what they earned. ”That's their conscience,” thought Pelle. ”At heart they are good comrades.”

There seemed to be some hope of success for his audacious maneuver. A group of Germans took no part in the orgy, but had set up a separate colony in the remotest corner of the hall. They were there to make money!

In one of the groups a dispute broke out between the players; they were reviling one another in no measured language, and their terms of abuse culminated in the term ”strike-breaker.” This made them perfectly furious. It was as though an abscess had broken; all their bottled-up shame and anger concerning their infamous position burst forth. They began to use knives and tools on one another. The police, who kept watch on the factory day and night, were called in, and restored tranquillity.

A wounded smith was bandaged in the office, but no arrest was made. Then a sudden slackness overcame them.

They constantly crowded round Pelle. He was a new man; he came from outside. ”How are things going out there?” was the constant question.

”Things are going very well out there. It's a worse lookout for us in here,” said Pelle.

”Going very well, are they? We've been told they are near giving in.”

”Who told you that?”

”The bosses of the factory here.”

”Then they were fooling you, in order to keep you here.”

”That's a lie! And what d'you mean by saying it's a worse look-out for us? Out with it, now!”

”We shall never get regular work again. The comrades are winning--and when they begin work again they'll demand that we others shall be locked out.”

”The devil--and they've promised us the best positions!” cried a great smith. ”But you're a liar! That you are! And why did you come here if they are nearly winning outside? Answer me, d.a.m.n it all! A man doesn't come slinking into this h.e.l.l unless he's compelled!”

”To leave his comrades in the lurch, you might add,” replied Pelle harshly. ”I wanted to see how it feels to strike the bread away from the mouths of the starving.”

”That's a lie! No one would be so wicked! You are making fools of us, you devil!”

”Give him a thras.h.i.+ng,” said another. ”He's playing a crooked game.

Are you a spy, or what do you want here? Do you belong to those idiots outside?”