"Besides," I added, "he did not offer to put us up at his clubs or in
any way behave like a gentleman."
Knowlton grinned his favourite grin.
"Ted, I hadn't thought of that as an index of Norwood's business
ability, but damned if I don't think your reason as good as mine."
With that he pressed a button on his desk and a spotlessly clean young
woman responded.
"Bring me the file of our customers," he said, and she withdrew.
"What shall I do?" I asked.
"You--oh, yes--you go out to the drafting room and design the testing
laboratory. Come to me if you get stuck on any details. As for me," he
added, "I'm going to start looking for that Senegambian this very
minute."
My arrival in the drafting room caused a mild sensation among its
occupants, but a drawing table, desk, instruments, and materials were
speedily placed at my disposal, and as there was a rule against talking
in this room, I was left in silence, but under close observation, to
work out my problem. Furtively I produced from my pocket a useful manual
containing practical tables and formulae for nearly everything under the
sun, and with the help of this and my actual knowledge of what a
chemical laboratory ought to contain, I had made considerable progress
with my rough pencilled plan when the twelve-o'clock whistle blew. I had
become so absorbed in my work that I had forgotten all about the noon
hour.
I found Knowlton in the office where I had left him. He was surrounded
by piles of papers and correspondence which he was reading, checking,
and making notes about on separate slips of paper.
"Not found him yet, but I think I'm on his trail, Ted. Let's go to
lunch."
There was no lunchroom in the neighborhood, so there was nothing for it
but to go back to Schaefer's in the broiling heat of the packed trolley
car, and again face the flies and perils of that dining room. As
Knowlton insisted upon our being back at the factory before the
one-o'clock whistle, there was no time to change one's clothes or to see
about a place to sleep that night. Never had I felt so dirty as I did
after a morning in the heat and soft coal smoke of Deep Harbor. Luncheon
at Schaefer's proved to be "dinner," a noisy, crowded, hurried affair in
which the waitress made no pretence of serving one's order, but brought
what she considered a standard type of meal. There was no time to
protest or change things. Knowlton, as usual, ate prodigiously, with the
most annoying conceivable relish, of everything put before him, and
gulped down in addition two large tumblers of watery milk.
We were back at ten minutes to one, and promptly, as the whistle blew, I
stood once more before my drawing table and resumed the task. About
three o'clock it seemed as if I could not stand another moment. My knees
shook with fatigue and the unaccustomed strain of standing hour after
hour, but there were no seats in the drafting room, and every one had to
do his work standing up. At four I thought I should have to go to
Knowlton's office and beg for mercy, but I didn't, because I knew he
would think me unable to stick even a simple job through. At five the
office staff left, including the drafting room, but there was still an
hour for me. And this was to go on five and a half days a week, month
after month, I thought! How did factory workers endure it without going
mad?
When the six o'clock whistle blew, I could almost have cried with
relief. I nearly staggered as I came into Knowlton's office, and sank
into a chair mopping my face.
Knowlton grinned.
"Young gentleman from London, England, finds ten hours in an American
factory on a nice warm July day something of a physical effort--shall I
have that put in tomorrow's Social Notes?" he asked.
"You can't insult me, Knowlton," I said. "I am damned tired, and I have
sense enough to admit it. So are you, I suspect, only you've been
sitting down."
"Well," he conceded, "this elusive Senegambian I am after does make me
tired--especially as friend Norwood is too sly a customer to be caught
with the goods on him. If the Senegambian is there--and I've already
found his footprints--we can trust Norwood to have made himself safe
first. Let's go eat."
"Not at Schaefer's--God, not there!" I wailed. "I've had all I can stand
of that hole."
"All right. We'll try the Rathskeller, but don't forget we haven't, as
yet, any place to sleep."
I was too tired to eat when we reached the little musty hot German
restaurant down under the sidewalk off State Street, but the waiter did
produce a large foaming mug of German beer in which I blunted some of
the acuteness of my physical aches and pains.