noon
At work , the men who had been so silent in the office of the hotel were alert and wonderfully busy , hurrying here and there at a word from the old man and sawing and nailing furiously . They seemed bent upon outdoing each other and when one fell behind they laughed and shouted at him , asking him if he had decided to quit for the day . But though they seemed determined to outdo him the old man kept ahead of them all , his hammer beating a rattling tattoo upon the boards all day . At the noon hour he had given each of the men one of the pamphlets from his pocket and on the way back to his hotel in the evening he told Sam that the others had tried to show him up . `` They wanted to see if I had juice in me , '' he explained , strutting beside Sam with an amusing little swagger of his shoulders . Sam was sick with fatigue . His hands were blistered , his legs felt weak , and a terrible thirst burned in his throat .