Page:Frank Packard - On the Iron at Big Cloud.djvu/22

 them. What Rafferty said—went. It was two weeks before he delivered his verdict.

"A damned pink-faced dude!" he announced and terminated his remark with a stream of black-strap juice by way of an exclamation mark.

The fiat had gone forth!

Down in the pits, stripping the engines of their motion gear, the fitters passed resolutions of confidence in Rafferty's judgment, and among the lathes and planers the machinists did likewise. The concurrence of the forge gang was expressed by a vicious wielding of the big sledges that sent showers of sparks flying from the spluttering metal whenever Holman was sighted coming down the shop on a tour of inspection—a significant intimation to him to keep his distance. And that the sentiment of the shops might not be lacking in unanimity, the boilermakers, should Holman have the temerity to pause for an instant before a shell on which they were at work, would send up a din from their clattering hammers intolerable to any but the men themselves whose ears were plugged with cotton waste.

As for Holman, he might have been entirely unconscious of the hostility and ill-will of his subordinates for all the evidence he gave of being aware of it. He was busy mastering the routine and details of his new position. For a month he said nothing; then one morning over at headquarters he turned to Carleton, who was reading the train mail that had just come in.

"Why did Williams resign?" he asked quietly.