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high tide the factory floated into the sea.

The tall chimneys, with their three-pronged lightning rods, were reflected upside down in the water, where they wriggled and twisted with the undulating of the waves.

This factory, built on reclaimed land, was surrounded on three sides by a concrete wall that gave it the appearance of a prison. Solid and gloomy it towered, but its twin brother below was broken up by the ripples, like a fat man’s reflection in a cracked mirror.

When the gates were shut all communication with the village was cut off. Another world arose, a world completely cut off from demonstrations, from leaflets, from the groans of starving men. Provisions, raw materials, men—a launch brought all these from the mainland.

Here the bosses prided themselves on being out of reach of the unions’ clutches.

Through the thin, damp morning mist came the loud thudding sound of a launch as it approached the pier. From the strikers’ headquarters on the mainland, Handa, who had been awakened by a gnawing emptiness in his stomach, watched the boat. The deck was thick with workers, like