Maguire led him to a big contrivance which was called a shaper.  A boy of eighteen was operating it.  On its bed, which moved back and forth automatically, was bolted a great cake of iron—­a casting in the rough.  The machine was smoothing its surfaces.

“Show him,” Maguire said to the boy, “then report to me.”

The boy showed Bonbright efficiently—­telling him what must be done to that iron cake, explaining how the machine was to be stopped and started, and other necessary technical matters.  Then he hurried off.  Bonbright gazed at the casting ruefully, afflicted with stage fright. ...  He was actually about to perform real labor—­a labor requiring a certain measure of intellect.  He was afraid he would make a mistake, would do something wrong, and possibly spoil the casting.  He started the planer gingerly.  It had not seemed to move rapidly when the boy was operating it, but now the bed seemed fairly to fly forward and snap back.  He bent forward to look at the cutting he had made; it was right.  So far he was all right. ...  Surreptitiously he laid his palm in a mass of grease and metal particles and wiped it across his breast. ...  It was an operation which he repeated more than once that morning.

Gradually his trepidation passed and he began to enjoy himself.  He enjoyed watching that casting move resistlessly under the tool; watched the metal curl up in glittering little curlicues as the tool ate its way across.  He looked with pleasure at the surface already planed and with anticipation of the surface still in the rough. ...  It was interesting; it was fun.  He wondered vaguely if all men who worked at tasks of this kind found pleasure in them, not appreciating that years of doing the same thing over and over might make it frightfully monotonous.  The truth was the thing had not yet become work to him.  It was a new experience, and all new experiences bring their thrill.

Until the noon whistle blew he hardly took his eyes off his work.  He did not know that Maguire passed him a dozen times, not stopping, but watching him closely as he passed. ...  With the stopping of work about him he realized that he was tired.  He had lifted weights; he had used unaccustomed muscles.  He was hot, sweaty, aching.  He was hungry.

“Where do we eat?” he asked the man who stood at the next machine.

“Didn’t you bring no lunch?”

“No.”

“Some doesn’t,” said the man, as if he disapproved exceedingly of that class.  “They feed at the hash house across the street. ...  Hain’t broke, be you?”

Bonbright understood the kindly offer implied.  “Thank you—­no,” he said, and followed to the big wash room.

He ate his lunch from the top of a tall stool.  It was not the sort of food he was accustomed to, and the coffee was far from being the sort that had been served to him in his home or in his club—­but he hardly noticed it.  When he was through he walked back across the street and stood awkwardly among his mates.  He knew none of them.