"Sirs," he said, for they all claimed the nobility of the glass-blowers'
caste, "I come not to teach you, but to prove to the master's son that I
can make some trifle in the manner of your art."
No one spoke. The workmen in the elder Beroviero's house knew well
enough that Zorzi was a better artist than they, and they had no mind to
let him outdo them at their own furnace.
"Will any one of you gentlemen allow me to use his place?" asked Zorzi
civilly.
Not a man answered. In the sullen silence the busy hands moved with
quick skill, the furnace roared, the glowing glass grew in ever-changing
shapes.
"One of you must give Zorzi his place," said Giovanni, in a tone of
authority.
The little foreman turned quite round in his chair and looked on. There
was no reply. The pale men went on with their work as if Giovanni were
not there, and Zorzi leaned calmly on his blow-pipe. Giovanni moved a
step forward and spoke directly to one of the men who had just dropped a
finished glass into the bed of soft wood ashes, to be taken to the
annealing oven.
"Stop working for a while," he said. "Let Zorzi have your place."
"The foreman gives orders here, not you," answered the man coolly, and
he prepared to begin another piece.
Giovanni was very angry, but there were too many of the workmen, and he
did not say what rose to his lips, but crossed over to the foreman.
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