Chapter VI. The Grievance Committee - Page 2

meanin' no offence, sir, as men, fellow-men, as we might say--"

"What do you want, Wigglesworth? What's your trouble? You have some trouble, what is it? Spit it out, man," said the boss sharply.

"Well, sir, as I was a-sayin', this 'ere's a Committee (h)appinted to wait on you, sir, to lay before you certain facts w'ich we wish you to consider an' w'ich, as British subjecks, we feel--"

"Come, come, Wigglesworth, cut out the speech, and get at the things. What do you want? Do you know? If so, tell me plainly and get done with it."

"We want our rights as men," said Mr. Wigglesworth in a loud voice, "our rights as free men, and we demand to be treated as British--"

"Is there anyone of this Committee that can tell me what you want of me?" said Maitland. "You, Gilby, you have some sense--what is the trouble? You want more wages, I suppose?"

"I guess so," said Gilby, a long, lean man, Canadian born, of about thirty, "but it ain't the wages that's eatin' me so much."

"What then?"

"It's that blank foreman."

"Foreman?"

"That's right, sir." "Too blanked smart!" "Buttin' in like a blank billy goat!" The growls came in various undertones from the Committee.

"What foreman? Hoddle?" The boss was ready to fight for his subalterns.

"No! Old Hoddle's all right," said Gilby. "It's that young smart aleck, Tony Perrotte."

"Tony Perrotte!" Mr. Maitland's voice was troubled and uncertain. "Tony Perrotte! Why, you don't mean to tell me that Perrotte is not a good man. He knows his job from the ground up."

"Knows too much," said Gilby. "Wants to run everything and everybody. You can't tell him anything. And you'd think he was a Brigadier-General to hear him giving us orders."

"You were at the front, Gilby?"

"I was, for three years."

"You know what discipline is?"

"I do that, and I know too the difference between a Corporal and a Company Commander. I know an officer when I see him. But a brass hat don't make a General."

"I won't stand for insubordination in my mills, Gilby. You must take orders from my foreman. You know me, Gilby. You've been long enough with me for that."

"You treat a man fair, Mr. Maitland, and I never kicked at your orders. Ain't that so?"

Maitland nodded.

"But this young dude--"

"'Dude'? What do you mean, 'dude'? He's no dude!"

"Oh, he's so stuck on himself that he gives me the wearisome willies. Look here, other folks has been to the war. He needn't carry his chest like a blanked bay