Chapter 3 Summary

Jacobus is meeting with several laborers, passing out cigarettes. They are at the spare farmhouse that Mehring occasionally uses for company. Some of the men don't have proper work papers, but Jacobus reassures them he can help them work in town. He calls William at the Indian Store on the telephone as they look on skeptically and somewhat fearfully. He hangs up and replies that he will find out more that night. When he finally talks to a man just known as Dorcas' husband, he hears that there is no work in town. Jacobus is angry when one of the laborer youths, Izak, comes back from the nearby shantytown. He was sent to buy beer, which Jacobus feels is unsafe for a young man. The shantytowns are dangerous, lawless places. Even the police don't go there often, tending to let the "locals" take...