s. It's a matter of wages. The woman folk always approve
of them."

Schmidt rolled his eyes heavenward in despair.

"But, when we tell them of the ten per cent. cut! _Ach, Himmel!_"

Cicily turned a startled glance on her husband.

"A ten per cent. cut!" she exclaimed, involuntarily. "Why, Charles!"

Hamilton was annoyed by this unexpected irruption of the feminine into
the most serious of business discussions--the intrusion of the female on
the financial. He spoke with distinct note of disapproval in his voice:

"Now, Cicily, you know nothing of this."

Delancy, too, added the weight of his accustomed authority.

"Don't bother with things that do not concern you, Cicily." There was a
patronizing quality in the admonition that irritated the wife.

Ferguson spoke to the same effect, but with a radically different motive
underlying his words:

"Of course, it don't concern you, Mrs. Hamilton. I guess you'll be glad
to have some more money to put in bath-tubs and libraries and
gymnasiums. No, ma'am, it don't concern you. But it'll make some
difference to our wives and daughters, I'm thinking--ten per cent. out
of the pay-envelope every week. It'll take the curl out of my Sadie's
false hair, all right."

"There will be always some good in everything," Schmidt murmured
cynically, but not loud enough for the Yankee to hear.

Cicily was aware of the tension about her, and deemed it the part of
wisdom to create a diversion.

"What a coincidence!" she exclaimed, gayly. "Mrs. Schmidt and Mrs.
Ferguson and Mrs. McMahon are all coming around here this afternoon. I
invited them to attend a meeting of our club."

The dignified face of Mr. Delancy, which was that of the old-school
business man, clean-shaven save for the white tufts of side-whisker, was
distorted by an emotion of genuine horror; his pink cheeks grew scarlet.

"Cicily!" he gasped.

Hamilton, too, was hardly less disconcerted, for all his familiarity
with his wife's equalization whimsies.

"Invited them here?" he questioned, frowning.

The manner of both utterances was of a sort that must inevitably offend
the husbands of the women. Cicily, with the sensitiveness of her sex,
sought to cover the impression by speaking with a manner of increased
enthusiasm.

"Oh, yes," she answered. "Isn't it good of them? They have promised to
return my call this afternoon."

Ferguson yielded to a Yankee propensity for dry humour:

"I only hope that Mr. Delancy an