PLAYING WITH CONCRETE
It was not the Ethels and Dorothy alone who appeared at the "new place"
the next afternoon to make the experiments with concrete. Helen, Ethel
Brown's elder sister, and her friend, Margaret Hancock, of Glen Point,
were so interested in the younger girls' account of what they were going
to do with Mr. Anderson's help that they came too.
As they puffed up the steep knoll on which the new house was to stand
they stopped beside the cellar hole to see what progress had been made
since the day before.
"They have just frisked along!" Dorothy exclaimed when she saw that not
only was the inside fence-mold all built but that the concrete floor was
laid and that the men were pouring the mixture in between the planks and
the earth wall and pounding it down as they poured.
"Mr. Anderson said 'you can't fool round when you're working with
concrete,'" Ethel Brown repeated. "They aren't, are they?"
The men were all working as fast as they could move, some of them
shovelling the materials into the mixer, others running the machine,
others wheeling the wet concrete in iron barrows to the men at the edge
of the cellar who tamped it down as fast as it was poured into the narrow
space that defined the growing wall.
"When it is full, way up to the top, what happens next?" Dorothy inquired
of Mr. Anderson who came over to where they were standing.
"Then we're going to build on it a three foot wall of concrete blocks to
support the upper part of the house."
"That's the wall that has the cellar windows in it?"
"Yes."
"Then do make good big ones; Mother likes a bright cellar," urged
Dorothy.
"We're going to make her a beauty," promised the contractor. "Come up
into your garden now and let's get this concrete work up there done.
Here, Luigi," he called to an Italian, "bring us a load of concrete over
there," and he waved his hand in the direction of the spot where Patrick
had dug the hole for the tub.
They all examined the hole with care and the Ethels fitted in the tub and
found that their digger had done his work skilfully, since there were
just about three inches between the earth and the tub all around. They
pulled the tub out again and under Mr. Anderson's direction they greased
it thoroughly.
"We want to do every bit we can ourselves," they insisted when he
suggested that Luigi might do that part for them.
"Don't forget the hole for the drainage," he reminded them. "Have you got
your stick? And on which side are you going to have that?"
They surveyed the ground about the hole and decided that a drainage pipe
might run a few inches underground for a short distance and discharge
itself at the edge of a bank below which a vegetable garden was to lie.
"If you're careful what you plant there it will be an advantage to the
ground to have this dampening once in a while," said Mr. Anderson, who
was something of a gardener. "There won't be enough water to drown out
any of your plants."
Luigi emptied a load of concrete into the hole and while he was gone to
get a new supply the girls thumped it down hard, fitted in the greased
tub and wedged a bit of broomstick which Roger, Ethel Brown's brother,
had cut for Dorothy into the space between the tub and the earth just at
the top of the concrete flooring. When Luigi came back they were ready to
thump as he poured and three loads filled up the space entirely.
"Now, then, Luigi will bring you one of the smoothing tools that the men
over there are using and you can make the top look even," and Mr.
Anderson gave more instructions to the Italian.
"It will be pretty to have some plants at the edge so they'll bend over
and see themselves in the water," suggested Margaret.
"I should think there must be some water plants that would grow inside
without much trouble," Ethel Blue said.
"We must look that up; they'd probably need a little soil of some sort,"
Helen reminded them.
"They'd be awfully pretty," said Dorothy complacently. "Don't you seem to
see it--with gold fish swimming around among the stems?"
"Dicky might lend us his old turtle," laughed Ethel Brown. "He's tired of
taking care of it. You could put a stick in here partly above the water,
for him to sun himself on. I don't see why he wouldn't be quite happy
here."
Dicky's turtle was a family joke. Dicky had found him two years before
and had taken him home thinking he was a piece of stone. His excitement
and terror when the stone lying on the library table stuck out first a
head and then one leg after another to the number of four, had never been
forgotten by the people who saw him at this thrilling moment.
"Now for your bird's bath," Mr. Anderson reminded his pupils. "You have
to work fast, you know."
Dorothy brought out her two shallow basins, one smaller than the other.
The larger had its inside well greased and the smaller was thoroughly
rubbed over on its under side. Into the larger they poured about an inch
of concrete and then squeezed the smaller dish into it, but not so
sharply that it cut through. They filled in the crack between the two,
pushing and patting the mixture into place, and they smoothed the edge so
that it turned over the rim of the larger bowl before they cut it off
evenly all around with a wire.
"There," said Mr. Anderson as he watched them. "We'll see what will come
from that. It might be better done--" at which the girls all pulled long
faces--"but also, it might be worse, or I'm very much mistaken."
"I wish we could make some garden furniture," sighed Dorothy, holding up
her dripping hands helplessly, but at the same time gazing with joy at
their new manufacture.
"You could if you would make the forms," said Mr. Anderson. "All you need
to do is to make a bench inside of another bench and fill the space
between with concrete."
"That sounds easy, but if you were a girl, Mr. Anderson, you might find
it a little hard to make the forms."
"We can all drive nails," insisted Ethel Brown stoutly. "I believe I'll
try."
But the others laughed at her and reminded her that she would have to
drive the nails through rather heavy planking, so she gave up the notion.
"What are the walls going to be made of?" Margaret asked Dorothy.
"Something fireproof, Mother said, but I don't know what she finally
decided on. I'll ask Mr. Anderson."
"Plaster on hollow tile," the contractor answered absent-mindedly over
his shoulder, as he walked briskly before them back to the cellar.
The girls saw that he was too full of business now to pay any more
attention to them, so they thanked him for giving them so much time and
made some investigations on their own account among the piles of material
lying about on the grounds.
"I wonder if this could be 'hollow-tile,'" Ethel Blue said to the rest as
she came across a stack of strange-looking pieces of brown earthenware.
"It's certainly hollow," returned Ethel Brown, "but I always supposed
tiles were flat things. That's a tile Mother sets the teapot on to keep
the heat from harming the polish of the table."
They stood about the pile of brown, square-edged pipes, roughly glazed
inside and out, through whose length ran three square holes. They asked
two workmen as they passed what they were. One said "Hollow tile," and
the other, "Terra-cotta."
"I suspect they're both right," Helen decided. "Probably they're hollow
tile made of terra-cotta."
"But I thought terra-cotta was lighter brown and smooth. They make little
images out of terra-cotta," insisted Dorothy.
"I've seen those," agreed Margaret, "but I suppose there can be different
qualities of terra-cotta just as there are different qualities of china."
"This stuff is fireproof, any way," explained Dorothy. "I remember now
hearing Mother and the architect talking about it. And they said
something about a 'dead air space.' That must mean the holes."
"What's dead air space for?" inquired Ethel Blue.
"I think it dries up the dampness, or keeps it out so that it doesn't get
into the house."
"These are useful old blocks, then, even if they aren't pretty," decided
Helen, patting the ugly pile.
Mr. Anderson strolled toward them again after giving various directions
to his men.
"Just how is this tile used?" inquired Dorothy, as he seemed to be more
at leisure now.
"We build a wall of this hollow tile," he answered; "then we put the
plaster right on to it. Do you see that the outside is rather rough? That
is so the plaster will have something to take hold of. We mix it up of
cement and lime and sand and put on three coats. The first one is mixed
with hair, and mashed on hard so that it will stick and it is roughened
so that the next coat will stick to it."
"Is the next coat made of the same stuff?"
"Without the hair; and the third coat is as thin as cream and is flowed
on to make a smooth-looking outside finish."
"That's a lot of work," commented Dorothy.
"That's not all we're going to do to your walls; Mrs. Smith wants them to
be a trifle yellowish in tone--a little warmer than the natural color of
the plaster--so we're going to wash on some mineral matter that will give
them color and waterproof them at the same time."
"Killing two birds," murmured Helen.
"Then the whole house will look plastery except the roof and chimneys,"
said Ethel Brown.
"Including the roof and chimneys," returned Mr. Anderson. "We're going to
use concrete shingles--"
"Concrete shingles! Doesn't that sound funny!"
"They are colored, so they look like green or red shingles."
"What color is Mother going to have?"
"Dark green. The chimney is to be made of reinforced concrete."
"'Reinforced' must mean 'strengthened,' but how do you strengthen it?"
inquired Margaret.
"You've seen how we build a mold to pour the concrete in; inside of the
mold we build a sort of cage of steel rods. Don't you see that when the
concrete hardens it would be almost impossible for such a reinforced
piece of work to break through?"
"Couldn't an earthquake break it?"
"An earthquake might give a piece of solid concrete such a twist that it
would crack through, but suppose the crack found itself up against a
steel rod? Don't you think it would complicate matters?"
The girls thought it would.
"I'm awfully glad our chimney is going to be reinforced," Dorothy
exclaimed, "because up on this knoll we're going to feel the wind a lot
and it would be horrid if the chimney should fall down!"
"It certainly would," agreed the Ethels, but Mr. Anderson assured them
that they need not be afraid of any accident of the sort with a
reinforced concrete chimney.
"I've seen skyscrapers going up in New York," said Margaret "and all the
beams were of steel. Are you going to use steel beams here?"
"No, we don't often use steel construction for small houses, but this
house is going to be more fireproof than most small houses even if it
does have wooden beams. You watch it as it goes on and notice all the
points that make for fireproofness. It will interest you," Mr. Anderson
promised as he walked away.
The girls all washed their hands as well as they could with the hose with
which the workmen watered the concrete mixture, but they had nothing to
dry them on and they walked down the road holding them before them and
waving them in the breeze.
"Mother will think we are crazy if she happens to be looking out of the
window," said Dorothy.
"My aunt sent you a message, Dorothy," said Margaret.
"What aunt? I didn't know you had an aunt," replied Dorothy.
"She seems like a new aunt to us; James and I haven't seen her since we
were little bits of things."
"Where does she live?" asked Ethel Blue.
"In Washington. She's an interior decorator and she's awfully busy, so
when she has had to come on to New York to buy materials or to see people
she has never had a chance to stay with us."
"Is she going to make a visit this time?" inquired Ethel Brown.
"She has come for a long visit now. She has a commission to decorate a
house in Englewood. It's going to take her several weeks, and then she
wants to rest and do some studying and to make the rounds of the
decorators in the city, so it will be several months before she goes back
again."
"That's nice," said Ethel Blue politely, and she was glad she had thought
so because Margaret said at once, "We think it's splendid. She's a young
aunt, lots and lots younger than Mother, and James and I think she's
loads of fun."
"What was her message to me?" asked Dorothy.
"O, we were telling her about the United Service Club and the things we
did--sending gifts to the war orphans and celebrating holidays and our
plans for helping some poor women and children in the summer and for
taking care of the Belgian baby. She was awfully interested and said she
felt as if she knew all of you people and the Watkinses quite well, we
talked about you so much. Then we told her about Dorothy's house, and how
Mrs. Smith had said we might all give our opinions about the decorating,
and she asked us to tell you that she'd be very glad indeed to act as
consulting decorator when you come to the inside work."
"Why, that's awfully sweet of her!" exclaimed Dorothy. "Mother isn't
going to have a regular decorator, and I know she'll be immensely pleased
to have Miss--what is your aunt's name?"
"Graham; she's our Aunt Daisy!"
"--to have Miss Graham give us advice and 'check up' on our suggestions."
"By the time your house is ready for that part she will have finished her
Englewood house; but she said she'd be glad to come over and see the
house and the plans any time when she was free for the afternoon, and she
hoped you'd consult her about everything you wanted to."
"Daisy is a pretty name, isn't it?" Ethel Blue murmured to herself. "I
wish one of us was named Daisy."
"Her name is really Margaret; I'm named after her. Daisy is the nickname
for Margaret, you know."
"It's a lovely name," said Ethel Blue again.
"And please tell Miss Daisy that I think she's the finest ever, and
Mother will think so, too, when I tell her about this," added Dorothy.
"And do ask her to come over to one of the U. S. C. meetings when we
happen to be doing something that will interest her," concluded Helen,
who was the president of the club.