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ad. I hadn't yet stopped to figure out what the goal was but that it was worth while I had no doubt for I was no longer stationary. I was a constructor. I was in touch with a big enterprise of development. I don't know that I've made myself clear. I wasn't very clear in my own mind then but I know that I had a very conscious impression of the sort which I've tried to put into words. And I know that it filled me with a great big joy. I never woke up with any such feeling when with the United Woollen. My only thought in the morning then was how much time I must give myself to catch the six-thirty. When I reached the office I hung up my hat and coat and sat down to the impersonal figures like an automaton. There was nothing of me in the work; there couldn't be. How petty it seemed now! I suppose the company, as an industrial enterprise, was in the line of development, but that idea never penetrated as far as the clerical department. We didn't feel it any more than the adding machines do. Ruth had a good breakfast for me and when I came into the kitchen she was trying to brush the dried clay off my overalls. "Good Heavens!" I said, "don't waste your strength doing that." She looked up from her task with a smile. "I'm not going to let you get slack down here" she said. "But those things will look just as bad again five minutes after I've gone down the ladder." "But I don't intend they shall look like this on your way to the ladder," she answered. "All right," I said "then let me have them. I'll do it myself." "Have you shaved?" she asked. I rubbed my hand over my chin. It wasn't very bad and I'd made up my mind I wouldn't shave every day now. "No," I said. "But twice or three times a week--" "Billy!" she broke in, "that will never do. You're going down to your new business looking just as ship-shape as you went to the old. You don't belong to that contractor; you belong to me." In the meanwhile the boy came in with my heavy boots which he had brushed clean and oiled. There was nothing left for me to do but to shave and I'll admit I felt better for it. "Do you want me to put on a high collar?" I asked. "Didn't you find the things I laid out for you?" I hadn't looked about. I'd put on the things I took off. She led me back into the bed room, and over a chair I saw a clean change of underclothing and a new grey flannel shirt. "Where did you get this?" I asked. "I bought it for a dollar,"
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