d about a prize-fighter's
training-quarters, hence the quick duck.

"Also, you'll have easy--"

"Easy!" The hatter had spoken prematurely again.

"What?" scowled Hendrik.

"Hours," hastily explained the man.

"We ask only for fair play," pursued the leader.

"Yeh; sure!" murmured Fleming, with the cold enthusiasm of all paid
lieutenants of causes.

"And we must make up our minds to play fair with employers, so that
employers will play fair with us."

"Like hell they will!" This was from a tall, thin, toothless chap.
Reason: Tapeworm and booze. Name: Mulligan. Recreation: Chiropodist's
favorite.

"I'll prove it to you," said Hendrik, very earnestly.

"Perhaps _to_ but not _by_ me," muttered Mulligan.

"Union wages will be twenty cents an hour."

"Never get it!" mumbled an old fellow with what they call waiter's
foot--flattened arch. "Never!"

"Never," came in chorus from all the others, their voices ringing with
conviction.

"I'll have the jobs to give out. I guess I know how much you'll get."
The flame of hope lit fourteen pairs of blear eyes. Maybe this boob had
the cash and desired to separate himself from it. All primitive people
think the fool is touched of God. Hunger makes men primitive.

"I'll fix the wages!" declared Hendrik again. He saw himself feeding
these men; therefore he felt he owned them absolutely. It isn't, of
course, necessary actually to feed people, or even to promise to feed
them, to own them. Nevertheless, his look of possession imposed on these
victims of a democracy. They mutely acknowledged a boss.

Instantly perceiving this, a sense of kindly responsibility came upon
Hendrik. These were his children. He said, paternally, "We'll now have a
beer--on me!"

Fleming, to show his divine right to the place of vice-regent, led the
way to a joint on Washington Street.

Hendrik saw, with carefully concealed delight, the sensation caused even
in the Syrian-infested streets of the quarter by the sight of a handful
of sandwich-men in full regalia. He heard the exclamations that fell
from polyglot lips. It was a foretaste of success, the preface of a
famous man's biography!

The union drank fifteen beers, slowly--and quickly wiped the day's free
lunch from the face of the earth. The huskiest of the three bartenders
began to work with one hand, the other being glued to a bung-starter. He
felt it had to come.

"I'm boss!" said Hendrik to his children as a preliminary to discussing