[The Iron Heel by Jack London]@TWC D-Link book
The Iron Heel

CHAPTER III
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I was workin' overtime, an' I guess I was tired out some.

I worked seventeen years in them mills, an' I've took notice that most of the accidents happens just before whistle-blow.* I'm willin' to bet that more accidents happens in the hour before whistle-blow than in all the rest of the day.

A man ain't so quick after workin' steady for hours.

I've seen too many of 'em cut up an' gouged an' chawed not to know." * The laborers were called to work and dismissed by savage, screaming, nerve-racking steam-whistles.
"Many of them ?" I queried.
"Hundreds an' hundreds, an' children, too." With the exception of the terrible details, Jackson's story of his accident was the same as that I had already heard.

When I asked him if he had broken some rule of working the machinery, he shook his head.
"I chucked off the belt with my right hand," he said, "an' made a reach for the flint with my left.


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