“Was Jackson to blame?” I asked.

“He should a-got the damages.  He was a good worker an’ never made trouble.”

“Then you were not at liberty to tell the whole truth, as you had sworn to do?”

He shook his head.

“The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?” I said solemnly.

Again his face became impassioned, and he lifted it, not to me, but to heaven.

“I’d let me soul an’ body burn in everlastin’ hell for them children of mine,” was his answer.

Henry Dallas, the superintendent, was a vulpine-faced creature who regarded me insolently and refused to talk.  Not a word could I get from him concerning the trial and his testimony.  But with the other foreman I had better luck.  James Smith was a hard-faced man, and my heart sank as I encountered him.  He, too, gave me the impression that he was not a free agent, as we talked I began to see that he was mentally superior to the average of his kind.  He agreed with Peter Donnelly that Jackson should have got damages, and he went farther and called the action heartless and cold-blooded that had turned the worker adrift after he had been made helpless by the accident.  Also, he explained that there were many accidents in the mills, and that the company’s policy was to fight to the bitter end all consequent damage suits.

“It means hundreds of thousands a year to the stockholders,” he said; and as he spoke I remembered the last dividend that had been paid my father, and the pretty gown for me and the books for him that had been bought out of that dividend.  I remembered Ernest’s charge that my gown was stained with blood, and my flesh began to crawl underneath my garments.

“When you testified at the trial, you didn’t point out that Jackson received his accident through trying to save the machinery from damage?” I said.

“No, I did not,” was the answer, and his mouth set bitterly.  “I testified to the effect that Jackson injured himself by neglect and carelessness, and that the company was not in any way to blame or liable.”

“Was it carelessness?” I asked.

“Call it that, or anything you want to call it.  The fact is, a man gets tired after he’s been working for hours.”

I was becoming interested in the man.  He certainly was of a superior kind.

“You are better educated than most workingmen,” I said.

“I went through high school,” he replied.  “I worked my way through doing janitor-work.  I wanted to go through the university.  But my father died, and I came to work in the mills.

“I wanted to become a naturalist,” he explained shyly, as though confessing a weakness.  “I love animals.  But I came to work in the mills.  When I was promoted to foreman I got married, then the family came, and . . . well, I wasn’t my own boss any more.”

“What do you mean by that?” I asked.

“I was explaining why I testified at the trial the way I did—­why I followed instructions.”