The terrific tension had all
but reached the breaking-point. Then there rose a trembling,
palpitating sigh that seemed to come from a hundred throats, and
blended in a universal expression of relief. In her clear, high treble
Angelina began the everlasting "Fatal Wedding." That piece of false
sentiment had now a new significance. It became a song of deliverance,
and as the workers swelled the chorus, one by one, it meant that the end
of the day's toil was in sight.

By four o'clock the last box was done. Machines became mute, wheels were
stilled, and the long black belts sagged into limp folds. Every girl
seized a broom or a scrub-pail, and hilarity reigned supreme while we
swept and scrubbed for the next half-hour, Angelina and her chorus
singing all the while endless stanzas of the "Fatal Wedding."

Henrietta sent me for a fresh pail of water, which I got from the faucet
in the toilet-room; and as I filled my bucket I made a mental inventory
of my fellow-toilers' wardrobes. Hanging from rows of nails on all sides
were their street garments--a collection of covert-cloth jackets, light
tan automobile coats, black silk box-coats trimmed in white lace,
raglans, and every other style of fashionable wrap that might be cheaply
imitated. Sandwiched among the street garments were the trained skirts
and evening bodices of the "Moonlight Maids" of the night before, and
which were to be again disported at some other pleasure-club festivity
that Easter evening, now drawing near. Along the walls were ranged the
high-heeled shoes and slippers, a bewildering display of gilt buckles
and velvet bows; each pair waiting patiently for the swollen, tired feet
of their owner to carry them away to the ball. The hats on the shelf
above were in strict accord with the gowns and the cloaks and the
foot-gear--a gorgeous assortment of Easter millinery, wherein the
beflowered and beplumed picture-hat predominated.

I hurried back with my bucket of water, hoping in my heart that the
pleasure their wearers got out of this finery might be as great as the
day's work which earned it was long and hard. And so indeed it must have
been, if Henrietta was any authority on such questions.

"I love nice clothes, even if I do have to work hard to get them," she
remarked, as we turned into Bleecker Street a few minutes later, four
one-dollar bills safely tucked away in her stocking. "But say, you ought
to see my new hat. It's elegant," and drawing my arm thr