noon
THE SECOND GENERATION In six minutes the noon whistle would blow . But the workmen -- the seven hundred in the Ranger-Whitney flour mills , the two hundred and fifty in the Ranger-Whitney cooperage adjoining -- were , every man and boy of them , as hard at it as if the dinner rest were hours away . On the threshold of the long room where several scores of filled barrels were being headed and stamped there suddenly appeared a huge figure , tall and broad and solid , clad in a working suit originally gray but now white with the flour dust that saturated the air , and coated walls and windows both within and without . At once each of the ninety-seven men and boys was aware of that presence and unconsciously showed it by putting on extra `` steam . ''