receive their thanks
marched calmly down the street.

When Arthur reached home with the girls, Mr. Merrick was very indignant
at his report of the adventure. He denounced Skeelty in unmeasured terms
and declared he would find a way to protect Millville from further
invasion by these rough and drunken workmen.

There was no Sunday paper, so the girlish editors found the morrow a
veritable day of rest. They all drove to Hooker's Falls to church and
returned to find that old Nora had prepared a fine chicken dinner for
them. Patsy had invited Hetty Hewitt, in whom she was now greatly
interested, to dine with them, and to the astonishment of all the artist
walked over to the farm arrayed in a new gown, having discarded the
disreputable costume in which she had formerly appeared. The new dress
was not in the best of taste and its loud checks made dainty Louise
shudder, but somehow Hetty seemed far more feminine than before, and she
had, moreover, washed herself carefully and tried to arrange her
rebellious hair.

"This place is doing me good," she confided to her girl employers,
after dinner, when they were seated in a group upon the lawn. "I'm
getting over my nervousness, and although I haven't drank a drop
stronger than water since I arrived. I feel a new sort of energy
coursing through my veins. Also I eat like a trooper--not at night, as I
used to, but at regular mealtime. And I'm behaving quite like a lady. Do
you know, I wouldn't be surprised to find it just as amusing to be
respectable as to--to be--the other thing?"

"You will find it far more satisfactory, I'm sure," replied Patsy
encouragingly. "What most surprises me is that with your talent and
education you ever got into such bad ways."

"Environment," said Hetty. "That's what did it. When I first went to New
York I was very young. A newspaper man took me out to dinner and asked
me to have a cocktail. I looked around the tables and saw other girls
drinking cocktails, so I took one. That was where I turned into the
rocky road. People get careless around the newspaper offices. They work
under a constant nervous strain and find that drink steadies them--for
a time. By and by they disappear; others take their places, and they are
never heard of again except in the police courts. I knew a girl, society
editor of a big paper, who drew her five thousand a year, at one time.
She got the cocktail habit and a week or so ago I paid her fine for
getting pinched while i