is advice, they were welcome to it. His advice was to fight. The
masters had refused their reasonable ultimatum. Let the masters try and
carry out their contracts without work people! That was his way of
looking at it.

There was a rumble of applause. The militants were certainly in the
majority. A man got up from one of the front rows.

"I propose," he said, "that we strike to-morrow. They are working us as
hard as they can in shifts on special jobs now, in case they should get
left. Every hour we work makes it better for them. I say 'Strike!'"

There was a thunder of applause. A ballot box was brought and placed on
a table in front of the platform.

"They will strike," Aaron muttered,--"three thousand of them!
Splendid!"

Maraton shook his head.

"It is piecemeal work, this. They do not understand."

"They do not understand what?" Julia asked him, turning her head
swiftly.

He shrugged his shoulders.

"They will ask for five shillings a week more and get half-a-crown," he
said. "Half-a-crown a week! What difference can it make? Do you know
what Boulding's put on one side for distribution to their shareholders
last year?--what they put to their reserve fund? Why, it was a
fortune!"

A man from somewhere at the back of the hall climbed on to a seat to get
a better view and suddenly pointed out Maraton to his neighbours. A
little murmur arose from the vicinity. Some one mentioned his name.
The cry was taken up from the other side of the hall.

"Maraton!"

"Maraton!"

Maraton sat back, frowning. The cries, however, became more insistent.
The occupants of the platform were leaning forward towards him. The
chairman rose In his feet and beckoned. With obvious reluctance,
Maraton moved a few steps to the front. From the far corners of the
ill-lit hall, white-faced men climbed on to the benches, peering through
the cloud of smoke which hung almost like fog about the place. They
saluted him in all manner of ways--with cat-calls, hurrahs, stamping of
feet, clapping of hands. Maraton, who had climbed up on to the
platform, was soon surrounded.

Dale held out his hand.

"Thought you weren't going to honour us here, Mr. Maraton," he remarked
gruffly.

"I had not meant to," Maraton replied. "I came as one of the audience.
I wanted to hear, to understand if I could."

Dale stretched out his hand.

"This is Mr. Docker," he said, performing the introduction. "Mr.
Docker--Mr. Maraton."

"Come to support us, s