and voiles, garbardines and
galateas, lawns, organdies, crepes, and Madras shirtings, while he wrote
down figures on a sheet of paper. So complete was his absorption in this
task that Janet, although she had resented the insinuating pressure
of his former attitude toward her, felt a paradoxical sensation of
jealousy. Presently, without looking up, he told her to call up the
Boston office and ask for Mr. Fraile, the cotton buyer; and she
learned from the talk over the telephone though it was mostly about
"futures"--that Ditmar had lingered for a conference in Boston on his
way back from New York. Afterwards, having dictated two telegrams which
she wrote out on her machine, he leaned back in his chair; and though
the business for the day was ended, showed a desire to detain her. His
mood became communicative.

"I've been on the trail of that order for a month," he declared. "Of
course it isn't my business to get orders, but to manage this mill, and
that's enough for one man, God knows. But I heard the Bradlaughs were
in the market for these goods, and I told the selling house to lie low,
that I'd go after it. I knew I could get away with it, if anybody could.
I went to the Bradlaughs and sat down on 'em, I lived with 'em, ate with
'em, brought 'em home at night. I didn't let 'em alone a minute until
they handed it over. I wasn't going to give any other mill in New
England or any of those southern concerns a chance to walk off with
it--not on your life! Why, we have the facilities. There isn't another
mill in the country can turn it out in the time they ask, and even we
will have to go some to do it. But we'll do it, by George, unless I'm
struck by lightning."

He leaned forward, hitting the desk with his fist, and Janet, standing
beside him, smiled. She had the tempting gift of silence. Forgetting her
twinge of jealousy, she was drawn toward him now, and in this mood
of boyish exuberance, of self-confidence and pride in his powers and
success she liked him better than ever before. She had, for the first
time, the curious feeling of being years older than he, yet this did not
detract from a new-born admiration.

"I made this mill, and I'm proud of it," he went on. "When old Stephen
Chippering put me in charge he was losing money, he'd had three agents
in four years. The old man knew I had it in me, and I knew it, if I do
say it myself. All this union labour talk about shorter hours makes me
sick--why, there was a time