The Coolidge examiner., 1932-07-08


on a new subway in the max
ing was taking place directly in
front of one Of the metropolis most
glittering theaters.
That meant that the street itself
was converted into a 30-foot can
yon fenced off with improvised
wooden railings, whilethe limousines
and vehicles which drove up nightly
around performance time had TO
disgorge their furred and perfumed,
high-hatted and white-gloved occu-
pants on a little wooden runway
which carried them over the sub
way abyss.
Sometimes in their furs and per-
fumes, their capes and high hats,
the theatergoers stopped TO peer
down into the curious, the gro
tesque, the torch-lighted bowels of
the earth. where men swung from
cranes, or drilled into rock with
rasping noises that tore the ears or
sluiced great streams Of clayey wa
ter over granite-colored earth so
that 1t oozed into black, viscous
mud and flowed off to reveal more
rock that in its turn had to be
blasted.
II was a hideOus, fantastic spec
tacle Somewhat like the drawings
Of Dore TO illustrate Dante's Infer
no. The mems faces, as they la
bored. became grimed in black so
that their teeth, barred with effort,
sprang out Whitley. Even in the
biting winter cold, chests were bare
because Of the pull and strain.
Blowtorches tore out into the night.
II was indeed a scene TO invite the
squeals of the fur-wrapped women
and the interested contemplation
Of men.
A scene that made II all the
pleasanter, however, TO continue
along the runway and into the
warm, brilliantly lit foyer OF the
theater and then on into the vel
vety auditorium and the sound Of
an orchestra weaving softly and
bringing illusion and surcease from
such grim reality as the men out
side, forging into rock that lined
the inners of the earth and blast
Ing nature out of place that men
might ride in subways the faster,
the better, the quicker, to their des-
tinatiOns Of gain and greed.
The theater was surcease, all
right, after one look down into the
flickering chamber Of horrors.
The men themselves, digging that
subway, minded at first. 1t made
them growl and grumble TO have
these warm, fed people stand and
laugh and comment. II made ugly
lines come out in their faces, and
ugly words under their breath. But
after a while they became accus-
toned to the runway and its traffic.
Most Of the time they did not look
up at all.
There was one. though, a fellow
named OLAF Wentski, who did.
They fascinated him, those furred
and perfumed people on the run
way. They fascinated him In a
rather terrible way. The women
filed him with an anger that was
like warm water, choking him, in
his throat.
The men made his hands curl in
ward with desire to throttle.
Ii fascinated him 10 inflict this
pain upon himself, and yet it ter
rorized him.
Life was that way. To. resent, to
hate. to suffer, got you nowhere. 1t
was said that the Reds in Russia
were worse off than before the revo-
luton. There was no combating
the social system, so he had been
told over and over again. 1t made
Ii difficult TO belong to the union If
you voiced obstreperous views. The
union was TO protect men from IN
fair advantage, but not to instill
rebellion.
No, it get you nowhere. If you
voiced your hatred under your
breath TO the other men, they an
swered in kind under their breath,
but it got you nowhere. And yet,
for the life of him, Olaf could not
help hating.
Those women with furs that he
wanted for his Fania and his chill
dren.
Those men with position and
wealth and power that he wanted
for himself.
The subway canyon became a hell
to Olaff.
The strains of the music that
sometimes crept out between blasts
and blow torches and grindings and
drillings were slow poison in his
veins.
Great, slow, heroically built fell
low that he was, his moroseness
came to earn for him the name
"Glum."
Olaf was glum. With the sense
of injustice that weighted Down his
heart as he labored through the icy
nights to make possible master