you see those smokestacks against the sky, and the iron
scaffoldings that look like giant lacework, and the slag
heaps, and the coal piles, and those huge, grim tanks. Gad!
It's awful and beautiful. Like the things Pennell does."
"I came out here on the street car one day," said Fanny,
quietly. "One Sunday."

"You did!" He stared at her.

"It was hot, and they were all spilling out into the street.
You know, the women in wrappers, just blobs of flesh trying
to get cool. And the young girls in their pink silk dresses
and white shoes, and the boys on the street corners, calling
to them. Babies all over the sidewalks and streets, and the
men who weren't in the mills--you know how they look in
their Sunday shirtsleeves, with their flat faces, and high
cheekbones, and their great brown hands with the broken
nails. Hunkies. Well, at five the motor cars began
whizzing by from the country roads back to Chicago.
You have to go back that way. Just then the five o'clock
whistles blew and the day shift came off. There was a great
army of them, clumping down the road the way they do. Their
shoulders were slack, and their lunch pails dangled, empty,
and they were wet and reeking with sweat. The motor cars
were full of wild phlox and daisies and spiderwort."

Clarence was still turned sideways, looking at her. "Get a
picture of it?"

"Yes. I tried, at least."