Part 17

"I tell you that goddam shovel mine--" he began; but Dick, from the other side of the spout, shouted at us how many piles to shovel, and Shorty shut up. We were to get in the first big pile and the next little one.

The ladle was beginning to fill. "Heow!" yelled Dick.

Shorty and I went forward and put in the manganese. It was hot, but I took too much interest in shoveling faster than Shorty, to care. Then came the second ladle, during which Shorty's handkerchief caught on fire, and made him sputter a lot, and rid himself of some profanity in Anglo-Italian.

I went to that trough by Eight afterward, to wash off the soot and cinder, and put my head under water, straight down. I knew back-wall was coming, and sat down a minute, wondering, rather vaguely, how I was going to feel at six or seven the next morning.

Back-wall came. I had bad luck with it, trying too hard. It was too hot for one thing. There are times when a back-wall will be so cool you can hesitate a long second, as you fling your shovelful, and make sure of your aim; at others, your face scorches when you first swing back, and you let the stuff off any fashion, to get out of the heat. There's a third-helper on Five, I'm glad to say, who is worse than I. They put him out of the line this time; he was just throwing into the bottom of the furnace.

Everyone develops an individual technique. Jimmy's is bending his knees, and getting his shovel so low that it looks like scooping off the floor. Fred's is graceful, with a smart snap at the end.

Then front-wall. I start in search of a spoon and a hook. It's not easy to get one to suit the taste of my first-helper. There's one that looks twenty feet,--I haven't any technical figures on spoons,--but it's too long, I know, for Fred. There's a spoon three feet shorter, just right. Hell--with two inches melted off the end! I pick a short one in good repair,--he can use the thing or get his own,--and drag it to Seven, giving the scoop a ride on the railroad track, to ease the weight. Fred has put a hook over number one door; so I hurry, and lift the spoon handle with gloved hands to slip it on the hook. If it's not done quickly, you'll get a burn; you're an arm's length from molten steel, and no door between. I get it on, and pick up a shovel.

Front-wall can be very easy,--you can nearly enjoy it, like any of the jobs,--if the furnace is cool, and there's a breeze blowing down the open spaces of the mill. And, too, if the spoon hangs right in the hook, and the first-helper turns it a little for you, then you can stand off, six feet from the flame, and toss your gravel straight into the spoon's scoop. You hardly go to the water fountain to cool your head when the stunt's over. On number one the hook hung wrong, the spoon wouldn't turn in it, and you had to hug close, and pour, not toss. I tried a toss on my second shovel, and half of it skated on the floor.

"Get it on the spoon, goddam you!" from Nick.

So I did.

After that, we sat around for twenty minutes. Fred looked at the furnace once or twice, and changed the gas. Several gathered in front of Seven--Jock, Dick, the melter, Fred, and Nick.

"Do you know what my next job's going to be?" said Fred.

The others looked up.

"In a bank."

"Nine to five," said Dick. "Huh! gentlemen's hours."

"Saturday afternoons, and Sundays," said Fred.

The other faces glowed and said nothing.

"This wouldn't be so bad if there were Sundays," said Fred.

"I'll tell you, there'll come a time," broke in the melter, "when Gary and all the other big fellers will have to work it themselves--no one else will."

"Now in the old country, a man can have a bit of fun," said the Scotchman. "Picnics, a little singin' and drinkin',--and the like. What can a man do here? We work eight hours in Scotland. They work eight hours in France, in Italy, in Germany--all the steel mills work eight hours, except in this bloody free country."

The melter broke in again. "It's the dollar they're after--the sucking dollar. They say they're going to cut out the long turn. I heard they were going to cut out the long turn when I went to work in the mill, as a kid. I'm workin' it, ain't I? Christ!"

I left, to shovel in fluor spar with Fred.

When we finished, Fred said: "You better get your lunch now, if you want it. Then help Nick on the spout."

I ate in the mill restaurant. My order was roast beef, which included mashed potato, peas, and a cup of coffee--for thirty-five cents. Then I had apple pie and a glass of milk. The waiters are a fresh Jew, named Beck, and a short, fat Irish boy, called Pop. There is a counter, no tables; the food is clean.

I went back to help Nick on the spout, and found him already back on the gallery with a wheelbarrow of mud. He looked up gloomily and said: "One more."

I dumped the wheelbarrow, and went after more, bounced it over tracks and a hose, and up and down a little board runway to where the mud-box stands. After filling up, I went back slowly, dangerously, swayingly, over bits of dolomite and coal, navigated the corner of the gallery by a hair's tolerance, and dropped the handles of the wheelbarrow by Nick with relief. It's bad on my back, that's it. I'd rather do two back-walls, and tap three times in high heat, than wheel these exacting loads of mud.

Nick knelt on the other side of the spout, and I gave him the mud with my shovel, to repair the holes and broken places of the spout, which the last flow of molten steel had carried away. When he finished the big holes, I gave him small gobs of mud, dipping my hands in a bucket of water between each two, to keep the stuff from sticking. A wave of weakening heat rose constantly from the spout still hot from the last flow. I prayed God Nick would hurry. He made a smooth neat surface on the whole seven-feet of spout, rounding the edges with his hands.

When I came back from the spout, Fred was in front of the furnace, blue glasses on his nose, inspecting the brew. He put his glasses back on his cap, glanced at me, and pointed to a pile of dolomite and slag which had been growing in front of Number 3 door.