l, for one thing, to
supersede him without a qualm. But there was nothing else for it, and
he took off his overcoat, laid aside the coupling pin, and attacked
the stack of blue prints.

He worked rapidly, turning now and then from the plans for a
reference to the building book or the specifications, whistling softly,
except when he stopped to growl, from force of habit, at the office,
or, with more reasonable disapproval, at the man who made the
drawings for the annex. "Regular damn bird cage," he called it.

It was half an hour before Peterson came in. He was wiping the
sweat off his forehead with the back of his hand, and drawing
long breaths with the mere enjoyment of living. "I feel good," he
said. "That's where I'd like to work all day. You ought to go up
and sledge them timbers for a while. That'd warm you through, I
bet."

"You ought to make your timekeeper give you one of those brass
checks there and pay you eighteen cents an hour for that work.
That's what I'd do."

Peterson laughed. It took more than a hint to reach him. "I have
to do it. Those laborers are no good. Honest, I can lift as much
as any three men on the job."

"That's all right if those same three don't stop to swap lies
while you're lifting."

"Well, I guess they don't come any of that on me," said Peterson,
laughing again. "How long are you going to stay with us?"

The office, then, had not told him. Bannon was for a moment at a
loss what to say. Luckily there was an interruption. The red-headed
young man he had spoken to an hour before came in, tossed a tally
board on the desk, and said that another carload of timber had come
in.

"Mr. Bannon," said Peterson, "shake hands with Mr. Max Vogel, our
lumber checker." That formality attended to, he turned to Bannon
and repeated his question. By that time the other had his answer
ready.

"Oh, it all depends on the office," he said. "They're bound to
keep me busy at something. I'll just stay until they tell me to go
somewhere else. They ain't happy except when they've just put me
in a hole and told me to climb out. Generally before I'm out they
pick me up and chuck me down another one. Old MacBride wouldn't
think the Company was prosperous if I wasn't working nights and
Sundays."

"You won't be doing that down here."

"I don't know about that. Why, when I first went to work for 'em, they
hired me by the day. My time cards for the first years figured up four
hundred and thirty-six days