"Hey, lad!" old Dan cried cheerily, as Jack entered the little smoking-room. "Sit yer down a moment, an' have a cigarette. There's some over yonder!" When the young man had lit up and seated himself, Shearman asked: "Well! what's the pay-pers say to-night--eh? Aw wonder 'ow this 'ere war is goin' on?" "Badly, sir, I fear," was Sainsbury's prompt reply. "We don't seem to be able to move against the superior power of the enemy." "Superior power be 'anged, lad!" cried the round-faced, grey-haired old man, his eyes flashing as he spoke. "Aw don't believe in what these 'ere writers talk about--their big guns, their superior power, an' all that! We're still powerful enough in good old England to lick the 'ole lot o' them sour-krowts, as I 'eard a man in New Street callin' 'em yesterday." "Well, I hope so," laughed Sainsbury, who really was anxious to get upstairs to the drawing-room, where he knew Elise was eagerly awaiting him. "But at present we seem to be progressing very slowly. The Russian steam-roller, as it was called, has come to a halt." "Ah! a bit more o' them there writers' bunkum! What aw say is that we're a-bein' misled altogether. Nawbody tells the truth, and nawbody writes it. What yer reads to-day, lad, 'll be flatly contradicted to-morrow. So what's the use o' believin' anything?" He was, truly, a bluff old chap who, born and bred in Lancashire, had afterwards spent three parts of his life in and about Birmingham. Old Dan Shearman was a man who always wanted hard facts, and when he got them he would make use of them in business, as well as elsewhere, with an acumen far greater than many men who had been educated at a public school. He rather prided himself upon his national-school training, and was fond of remarking, "Aw doan't pretend to much book-learnin', but aw knows my trade, an aw knows 'ow to make money by it--which a lot o' people doan't!" Jack Sainsbury always found him amusing, for he was full of dry, witty remarks; and as he sat for a quarter of an hour, or so, the old fellow, puffing at his cigar--though he always smoked his pet pipe in his private office at the works--made some very caustic remarks about official red-tape at Whitehall. "We're a-makin' munitions now," he explained. "But oh! the queries we get, and the visits from officers in uniform--people who come and tell me 'ow aw should run my business, yet the first time they've ever seen a Drummond lathe is in one of my workshops. Aw say that 'arf of it's all a mere wicked waste of a man's time!" "Yes," sighed the young man--"I suppose there is far too much officialism; and yet perhaps it is necessary." Then he added, "Is Elise at home, do you know?" "Yes, she's at 'ome, lad--she's at 'ome!" laughed the old fellow cheerily. "Aw know you want to go oop to 'er. Well, aw did the same when I wor your age. Aw won't keep yer longer. So go oop, lad, an' see 'er. My wife's out somewhere--gone to see one of 'er fine friends, I expect."