"
Nance glanced up at the gaunt face with its empty eye socket and then
looked quickly away.
"Say," said the other new girl, complainingly, "is it always hot like
this in here? I'm most choking."
"We'll git the boss to put in a 'lectric fan fer you," suggested the
hollow-chested one, whose name was Mag Gist.
Notwithstanding her distaste for the work, Nance threw herself into it
with characteristic vehemence. Speed seemed to be the quality above all
others that one must strive for, and speed she was determined to have,
regardless of consequences.
"When you learn how to do this, what do you learn next?" she asked
presently.
Mag laughed gruffly.
"There ain't no next. If you'd started as a wrapper, you might 'a'
worked up a bit, but you never would 'a' got to be a chuck-grinder. I
been at this bench four years an' if I don't lose my job, I'll be here
four more."
"But if you get to be awful quick, you can make money, can't you?"
"You kin make enough to pay fer two meals a day if yer appetite ain't
too good."
Nance's heart sank. It was a blow to find that Mag, who was the cleverest
girl in the finishing room, had been filing bottle necks for four years.
She stole a glance at her stooped shoulders and sallow skin and the
hideous, empty socket of her left eye. What was the good of becoming
expert if it only put one where Mag was?
By eleven o'clock there was a sharp pain between her shoulder-blades, and
her feet ached so that she angrily kicked off first one shoe, then the
other.
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