ourself! Touch me if you
dasse!"

Many young men among the returning force had stout sticks in their
hands. Granville Joy was one of them. Andrew, who was quite unarmed,
pressed in before Ellen. Granville caught him by the arm and tried
to draw him back.

"Look here, Mr. Brewster," he said, "you keep in the background a
little. I am young and strong, and here are Sargent and Mendon.
You'd better keep back."

But Ellen, with a spring which was effectual because so utterly
uncalculated, was before Granville and her father, and them all. She
reasoned it out in a second that she was responsible for the strike,
and that she would be in the front of whatever danger there was in
consequence. Her slight little figure passed them all before they
knew what she was doing. She was in the very front of the little
returning army. She saw the threatening faces of the pickets; she
half turned, and waved an arm of encouragement, like a general in a
battle. "Strike if you want to," she cried out, in her sweet young
voice. "If you want to kill a girl for going back to work to save
herself and her friends from starvation, do it. I am not afraid! But
kill me, if you must kill anybody, because I am the one that started
the strike. Strike if you want to."

[Illustration: If you want to kill a girl for going back to work to save
herself from starvation, do it!]

The opposing force moved aside with an almost imperceptible motion.
Ellen looked like a beautiful child, her light hair tossed around
her rosy face, her eyes full of the daring of perfect confidence.
She in reality did not feel one throb of fear. She passed the
picket-line, and turned instinctively and marched backward with her
blue eyes upon them all. Abby Atkins sprang forward to Ellen's side,
with Sargent and Joy and Willy Jones and Andrew. Andrew kept calling
to Ellen to come back, but she did not heed him.

The little army was several rods from the pickets before a shot rang
out, but that was fired into the air. However, it was followed by a
fierce clamor of "Scab" and a shower of stones, which did little
harm. The Lloyds marched on without a word, except from Sadie Peel.
She turned round with a derisive shout.

"Scab yourselves!" she shrieked. "You dassen't fire at me. You're
scabs yourselves, you be!"

"Scabs, scabs!" shouted the men, moving forward.

"Scab yourself!" shouted Sadie Peel.

Abby Atkins caught hold of her arm and shook her violently. "Shut
up, can't