Breakthroughs

we’re supposed to do?”

“We need a proper antiaircraft gun, sir, a one-pounder, not just the machine gun,” Brearley said.

Kimball nodded. That might help. It wasn’t the answer, though. For the life of him, he didn’t know what the answer was.

XIII

Sylvia Enos was discovering that Brigid Coneval had been right: Boston held plenty of jobs. A lot of them paid better than the one she’d had in the canning plant, too. In the time since she last looked for work, wages had risen sharply. Her own had gone up, too, but not by so much. The more she saw what others were getting, the more she kicked herself as a fool for not quitting sooner.

She also discovered many more jobs were open to women than had been true when she got work after George went into the Navy. She didn’t see any women in overalls with pickaxes and sledgehammers on road-paving crews, but that was about the only limitation she found.

“Reason for quitting previous position?” a-female-clerk asked at a shoe factory.

“Both my children came down with chicken pox at the same time,” she answered, as she’d answered several times already. She looked for a sympathetic glance from the clerk, who wore a wedding band, but got nothing but the Well, where’s the rest of it? expression a bored man might have used. A bit nonplused, she went on, “I didn’t have anyone else who could watch them, and the canning plant wouldn’t hold the job for me-they could hire someone without any experience and pay her less.”

That still rankled. They’d used her, and then they went and threw her away with no more hesitation than if she’d been a torn label. Massachusetts, despite agitation, did not let women vote. If it had, Sylvia would have voted Socialist without a moment’s hesitation.

“Except for that, will this plant give you a good character?” The clerk made as if to reach for the telephone on her desk.

“Yes, I think so,” Sylvia said.

The clerk did not pick up the earpiece and ask for the operator. Sylvia smiled to herself. The woman had wanted to see if she’d been lying and could be panicked into revealing it. After scribbling a note to herself, the woman said, “You do know how to use a sewing machine?”

“Oh, yes.” Sylvia nodded. “I’m like most people, I suppose. I have one at home, and I use it when I have the time. I buy some ready-to-wear, but making clothes for myself and the children saves a lot of money.”

She’d done a lot of sewing while she was home with George, Jr., and Mary Jane. She’d sewn, and she’d taken care of the children, and she’d read the books and magazines in the apartment till she could have recited chunks of them from memory. She’d got out very little. She was hard pressed to remember when she’d felt more delight than that which filled her when her children’s blisters got crusty and scabbed over and the scabs started falling off.

“Have you ever sewn leather with a sewing machine?” the hiring clerk asked.

Sylvia shook her head. If she lied there, she would be too easily found out. “No, I’ve never done anything like that,” she admitted.

“Well, come try it,” the clerk said. “I’m sure we’ll be able to find you an empty machine.” She got up from her desk. “Follow me, please.”

Back in the enormous work area, little old men-too old to be conscripted-sat hunched over about a third of the sewing machines. Women of all ages used the rest. The men, with only a couple of exceptions, ignored Sylvia, so intent were they on their work. Most of the women looked her over, curious as she would have been to see who might be hired next.

“Here,” the clerk said, pointing to a machine with no one at it. “Let me find you a couple of leather scraps, and you can see what it’s like.”

The stool behind the sewing machine had no back and was not very comfortable, but it was an improvement over standing all day, which Sylvia had been doing before. When she stretched out her right leg to set her foot on the treadle, she got a surprise.

“We have electric motors on the machine,” the clerk said, seeing what must have been the startled look on her face. “It lets the operators work much faster on thick leather like this than they could with foot-powered machines. You’ll see what I mean.” She handed Sylvia two pieces of shoe leather. “Join these together with two straight seams about a quarter-inch apart.”

“All right,” Sylvia said. Sure enough, the sewing machine had a switch near the base. She flicked it, and the motor hummed to life. Before guiding the pieces of leather under the needle, she noted how sturdy it was, and how strong and thick the thread that went through the eye.

As she started to sew, her right foot went up and down, up and down, even though it wasn’t on a treadle. The hiring clerk smiled. “A lot of girls do that when they first come here,” she said. “Some of them keep right on doing it even after they’ve worked here for years.”

“Do they?” Sylvia hardly noticed answering, because the needle snarled into action. The motor was strong as the very devil; she felt as if she were riding a poorly broken horse. The needle seemed to bite its way through the leather with every stitch the machine took. She’d hurt herself once or twice with her own sewing machine-she didn’t want to think what this one would do to her hand if she slipped or got careless.

She knew nothing but relief when she turned off the machine and handed the clerk her sample work. The woman examined it, then slowly nodded. “That’s very nice,” she said. “Even, straight. You can do the work, no doubt about it. Starting pay is fifty cents an hour. You go up to fifty-five after three months.”

That was more money than she’d been making at the cannery. “What time does the shift start tomorrow morning?” she asked.

“Eight o’clock,” the hiring clerk answered. “Eight o’clock sharp. You’re docked for every minute you’re late, and for every minute you clock out early.”

“I didn’t expect anything different,” Sylvia answered. This place looked to be like all the others. They wanted everything from the people they were generous enough to hire-that was how they’d look at it, anyhow-but what would they give back? What had the canning plant given back? Only a swift good-bye.

Still, at fifty cents an hour-fifty-five if she stayed-she’d soon make up for the time she’d lost taking care of the children. Fifty cents an hour plus the allotment she got from George’s pay was pretty good money. It was more money than she’d ever imagined making for herself. It would have been more money still had prices not risen right along with, and sometimes faster than, wages.

She got reminded how prices had gone up when she stopped at the Coal Board offices on the way home from the shoe factory. Being able to go without having the children along was an unusual blessing. The Coal Board was bureaucracy at its most plodding, and George, Jr., and Mary Jane did not take well to waiting in interminable lines.

Neither did Sylvia, not when the petty functionary she finally reached told her next month’s ration would be smaller but cost more. “This is the third time this year I’ve heard that!” she exclaimed in dismay. “It’s not right.”

“I’m sorry, ma’am,” the fellow said, sounding not a bit sorry. Why aren’t you in the Army? Sylvia thought resentfully. The Coal Board clerk went on, “I am not responsible for setting policy, you must understand, ma’am, only for seeing that it is carried out. Here, let me stamp your ration tickets”-he did, plying the rubber stamp with might and main-“so you can go over to Line 7C to pay for the coal. Remember, you cannot acquire it without the stamp I just gave and the pay confirmation stamp you will receive in Line 7C.”

“I remember,” Sylvia said. “How could I forget?” She went and stood in Line 7C, and stood there, and stood there.

At last, grudgingly, the clerk there accepted her money and added his square red stamp to the other bureaucrat’s round black one. “Obtaining coal without a ration coupon showing both authorization and pay confirmation marking is a violation of law punishable by fine or imprisonment or both,” he droned.

“Oh, yes, I know.” Sylvia could have repeated the rigmarole back at him. She heard it every month.

“We are pleased to have been of service to you,” the clerk said, just as if he meant it. Then, while she was