At the end he heard Hoeflinger whistle a
tune, while he was locking the door of the cottage and bolting the
sitting-room, and saw him, candle in hand, follow his wife to her
bedroom. Victor decided that this evening cried for revenge in his own
and in Spiele's name.

One day a thunderbolt came down before his eyes. Hoeflinger took leave
for three days and Victor was to remain alone with the idol and the
wife. The long one had to take this trip in the interest of the
workingmen's consumers' league which was now about to be realized.
Pratteler spent half of each night on his wheel. He ate nothing and
drank much. In those days he sought the midday rest with the other
laborers and lay down where Hoeflinger was wont to take his nap. Having
to pay so much more attention to the machine used up his nervous
energy, already much tried, and wore him out. He wanted to sleep, but
the wild and foolish notion that he might take the place of Hoeflinger
at night, too, banished the rest he craved. Then he jumped up and went
about in the courts and between the steel monsters, wherever the spirit
of revolt was brooding and whispering into his ears wild and
extravagant words. He breathed more freely when the siren called the
herd to work. His task of serving the idol filled him with a dull
indifferent hatred; he despised the monster. Sometimes he gave vent to
all the bitterness and the scorn his breast was harboring by spitting
into the revolving shining face. But that had not the slightest effect.
The idol continued to screech and wheeze, and its claw greedily grabbed
the next iron bar. Then Victor turned away weary and sad at heart, and
mounted the iron staircase to attend to the oiling.

At noon Spiele came as usual through the dark gate, jumped off her
wheel in her light-footed way and approached his place with a nod.
Recently she was inclined to be late and no longer waited in the crowd.
The first day, eager to cut short the ceremony of taking the lunch-pail
from her, he managed to bump his head against hers. She looked straight
at him, surprised at his haste. He trembled like a wall hit by a shot,
and did not know whether to fall backward, or forward into her arms.
Both blushed. He exclaimed with embarrassment: "Hopla!" and set the
pail down. She scolded him for neglecting his lunch, while his
trembling fingers rolled a cigarette and he lapsed into a moody
silence. The next day he let her do everything herself. He ate a
little, whi