Hal was glad of this opportunity to get better acquainted with his pit-boss. Alec Stone was six feet high, and built in proportion, with arms like hams—soft with fat, yet possessed of enormous strength. He had learned his manner of handling men on a sugar-plantation in Louisiana—a fact which, when Hal heard it, explained much. Like a stage-manager who does not heed the real names of his actors, but calls them by their character-names, Stone had the habit of addressing his men by their nationalities: “You, Polack, get that rock into the car! Hey, Jap, bring them tools over here! Shut your mouth, now, Dago, and get to work, or I'll kick the breeches off you, sure as you're alive!” Hal had witnessed one occasion when there was a dispute as to whose duty it was to move timbers. There was a great two-handled cross-cut saw lying on the ground, and Stone seized it and began to wave it, like a mighty broadsword, in the face of a little Bohemian miner. “Load them timbers, Hunkie, or I'll carve you into bits!” And as the terrified man shrunk back, he followed, until his victim was flat against a wall, the weapon swinging to and fro under his nose after the fashion of “The Pit and the Pendulum.” “Carve you into pieces, Hunkie! Carve you into stew-meat!” When at last the boss stepped back, the little Bohemian leaped to load the timbers.
The curious part about it to Hal was that Stone seemed to be reasonably good-natured about such proceedings. Hardly one time in a thousand did he carry out his bloodthirsty threats, and like as not he would laugh when he had finished his tirade, and the object of it would grin in turn—but without slackening his frightened efforts. After the broad-sword waving episode, seeing that Hal had been watching, the boss remarked, “That's the way you have to manage them wops.” Hal took this remark as a tribute to his American blood, and was duly flattered.
He sought out the boss that evening, and found him with his feet upon the railing of his home. “Mr. Stone,” said he, “I've something I'd like to ask you.”
“Fire away, kid,” said the other.
“Won't you come up to the saloon and have a drink?”
“Want to get something out of me, hey? You can't work me, kid!” But nevertheless he slung down his feet from the railing, and knocked the ashes out of his pipe and strolled up the street with Hal.
“Mr. Stone,” said Hal, “I want to make a change.”
“What's that? Got a grouch on them mules?”
“No, sir, but I got a better job in sight. Mike Sikoria's buddy is laid up, and I'd like to take his place, if you're willing.”
“Why, that's a nigger's place, kid. Ain't you scared to take a nigger's place?”
“Why, sir?”
“Don't you know about hoodoos?”
“What I want,” said Hal, “is the nigger's pay.”
“No,” said the boss, abruptly, “you stick by them mules. I got a good stableman, and I don't want to spoil him. You stick, and by and by I'll give you a raise. You go into them pits, the first thing you know you'll get a fall of rock on your head, and the nigger's pay won't be no good to you.”
They came to the saloon and entered. Hal noted that a silence fell within, and every one nodded and watched. It was pleasant to be seen going out with one's boss.
O'Callahan, the proprietor, came forward with his best society smile and joined th............