d smiled, and Victor knew that she was scheming something. Finally
she said: "We can dance too," and rose from her seat. She picked up her
skirt with two fingers of each hand and began to take some steps. She
swayed right and left. She bent back and forth. She laughed with her
fresh lips. When she slightly contracted her lids and sent her glance
like a song along the walls which seemed transformed, or when she fixed
her gaze upon the light of the hanging lamp which made her eyes open
like yellow daisies in a star-like halo, Victor said to himself that no
man could tell whither she was looking. But he was sure that all this
was done for him and in the name of the silent love they bore each
other. Nor did it strike him as strange that she never left her corner
seat on those evenings when her husband attended the frequent meetings
of the committee and left her alone with Victor. She then quietly
busied herself with her sewing or mended stockings and seemed
absorbed and absent-minded. Victor felt depressed and suspected that
his presence disturbed and perhaps irritated her, but they would have
to get used to it. When he could stand the strain no longer, he would
drag forth his wheel, light the big lantern and ride out into the
night. But his imagination would conjure up before his inner vision a
glowing picture of what she was doing and how she spent the evening
until night came. Sometimes he experienced a disappointment; for when
he returned she was sitting at the table with Hoeflinger, perhaps
laughing. That left a sting in his heart and would not let him sleep.

Of the strike he learned nothing more. He presumed that the big scheme
was running its course, and his sharpened eye noticed in the noon hour
the spirit that walked about among the steel monsters. But though he
had joined the organization and had made the personal acquaintance of
some unionists and social democrats the secret was so well kept by the
executive committee that no knowledge which was not voluntarily
communicated, reached the main body. Least known to him was the day and
hour of the strike. The longer ignorance lasted, the higher rose
expectation and the larger proportions did the act of deliverance
assume which was dawning on the horizon of the near future. On the
other hand, this uncertainty of the inevitable contributed toward
increasing and deepening the feeling of solidarity. The herd
strengthened the individual's heartbeat, and the individual
un