On the following Monday morning succeeding the encounter with Bolles, John boarded a car and went out to the shops as usual. He found nothing changed. The clerks in the office were busy with huge ledgers, though it is true that many a hand was less firm than on ordinary days. Rumors were flying about, from clerk to clerk, but none knew what the boss intended to do. From the shops themselves came the roaring and hammering that had gone on these thirty years or more. Bennington opened his mail and read each letter carefully. There were orders for rails, wire rope and sheets for boilers. The business of the concern always passed through his hands first. Even when he was out of town, duplicates of all orders were sent to him. He laid each letter in the flat basket; but this morning there was no "O. K.--J. B." scrawled across the tops. There would be time enough for that later. He rose and went to the window and looked down into the court. His heart beat heavily. There was something besides the possibility of a strike on his mind. But he flung this thought aside and returned to the strike. Was it right or was it wrong? Should he follow out his father's request, letter for letter? To punish two or three who were guilty, would it be right to punish several hundred who were not? And those clerks and assistants yonder, upon whom families depended, who had nothing to do with unionism, one way or the other, what about them? Fate strikes blindly; the innocent fall with the guilty. The analysis of his own desires was quick enough. Surrender? Not much! Not an inch, not a tenth part of an inch, would he move. If men permitted themselves to be sheep in the hands of an unscrupulous man, so much the worse. He promised himself this much: all those who appealed to him honestly, for these he would find employment elsewhere. There were other mills and shops in town that would be glad enough to employ a Bennington man, which signified capability. "Mr. Bennington?" John turned. Chittenden, the young English inventor, stood respectfully just within the door. "Good morning, Mr. Chittenden. How's the invention going? Did you get that special pulley from Pittsburgh yet?" "The invention is going very well, sir. But it is not of that I wish to speak." "Have you joined the union, then?" asked Bennington, with a shade of irony which did not escape the keen-eyed Englishman. "No!" This was not spoken; it was more like a shout. "I have joined no union, and my brain may rot before I do. The truth is, sir, I hear that if the men go out you'll tear down the shops." He hesitated. "Go on." "Well, I do not want this to happen on my account. I am young; I can wait; I'll take my tinkering elsewhere. You've been very good to me sir, and I should hate to see you troubled."