t of flowers stop, and end where immortal and melancholy music
begins. Unbidden tears came to her eyes, though she couldn't have told
you why, and again a sense of the fleeting of time disturbed her.

"Aunt Mary ..." In a few years she would be old, and her hair would be
white like Aunt Patty's.... And in a few years more....

But even as Wally Cabot kept her from thinking too much of Archey Forbes,
so now Archey unconsciously revenged himself and kept her thoughts from
centring too closely around Wally Cabot.

Archey called the next afternoon and Mary sat on the veranda steps with
him, while Helen made hay with Wally on a tete-a-tete above.

The few women who were left in the factory were having things made
unpleasant for them: that was what Archey had come to tell her. Their
canteen had been stopped; the day nursery discontinued; the nurses
discharged.

"Of course they are not needed there any longer, so far as that is
concerned," concluded Archey, "but they certainly helped us out of a hole
when we did need them, and it doesn't seem right now to treat them
rough."

At hearing this, a guilty feeling passed over Mary and left her cheeks
warm. "They'll think I've deserted them," she thought.

"Well, haven't you?" something inside her asked.

Some of her old dreams returned to her mind, as though to mock her. She
was going to be a new Moses once, leading her sisters out of the house of
bondage. Woman was to have things different. Old drudgeries were to be
lifted from her shoulders. The night was over. The dawn was at hand.

"Well, what can I do?" she thought uneasily.

"You can stop them from being treated roughly," something inside her
answered.

"I can certainly do that," she nodded to herself. "I'll telephone Uncle
Stanley right away."

But Uncle Stanley was out, and Mary was going riding with Wally that
afternoon. So she wrote a hurried note and left it at the factory as they
passed by.

"Dear Uncle Stanley," it read,

"Please see that every courtesy and attention is shown, the women who are
still working. We may need them again some day.

"Sincerely,

"MARY."

"Now!" she said to Wally, and they started on their ride. And, oh, but
that was a ride!

The afternoon was perfect, the sun warm but not hot, the air crystal
clear. It had showered the night before and the world, in its spring
dress, looked as though it had been washed and spruced for their
approval.

"All roses and lilies!" laughed W