Dangerous Days

The new munition plant was nearing completion. Situated on the outskirts

of the city, it spread over a vast area of what had once been waste

land. Of the three long buildings, two were already in operation and the

third was well under way.

To Clayton Spencer it was the realization of a dream. He never entered

the great high-walled enclosure without a certain surprise at the ease

with which it had all been accomplished, and a thrill of pride at the

achievement. He found the work itself endlessly interesting. The casts,

made of his own steel, lying in huge rusty heaps in the yard; the little

cars which carried them into the plant; the various operations by which

the great lathes turned them out, smooth and shining, only to lose their

polish when, heated again, they were ready for the ponderous hammer to

close their gaping jaws. The delicacy of the work appealed to him,

the machining to a thousandth of an inch, the fastidious making of the

fuses, tiny things almost microscopic, and requiring the delicate touch

of girls, most of whom had been watchmakers and jewelry-workers.

And with each carload of the finished shells that left the plant he felt

a fine glow of satisfaction. The output was creeping up. Soon they would

be making ten thousand shells a day. And every shell was one more chance

for victory against the Hun. It became an obsession with him to make

more, ever more.

As the work advanced, he found an unexpected enthusiasm in Graham. Here

was something to be done, a new thing. The steel mill had been long

established. Its days went on monotonously. The boy found it noisy,

dirty, without appeal to his imagination. But the shell plant was

different. There were new problems to face, of labor, of supplies, of

shipping and output.

He was, however, reluctantly coming to the conclusion that the break

with Germany was the final step that the Government intended to take.

That it would not declare war.

However, the break had done something. It had provided him with men

from the local National Guard to police the plant, and he found the

government taking a new interest, an official interest, in his safety.

Agents from the Military Intelligence and the Department of Justice

scanned his employment lists and sent agents into the plant. In the

building where men and women were hired, each applicant passed a desk

where they were quietly surveyed by two unobstrusive gentlemen in

indifferent business suits who eyed them carefully. Around the fuse

department, where all day girls and women handled guncotton and

high-explosive powder, a special guard was posted, day and night.