care, but 'Molls,' mind you--"

"Then they began hanging signs in our locker room--"

"'A woman's place is in the home' and things like that--"

"And then they began putting us next to strange men--"

"And, oh, their language, Miss Spencer--"

"Don't tell her--"

As the chorus continued, Mary began to feel hot and uncomfortable. "I had
no right to leave them in the lurch like that," she thought, and her
cheeks stung as she recalled her old plans, her old visions.

"And now they've got to go back to their kitchens for the rest of their
lives--and told they are not wanted anywhere else--because they are
women--"

The more she thought about it, the warmer she grew; and the higher her
indignation arose, the more remote were her thoughts of Wally--Wally with
his greatest adventure that was ever lived--Wally with his sweetest story
ever told. She looked at the hands of the two women below her and saw
three wedding rings.

"The roses and lilies didn't last long with them," thought Mary grimly.
"Oh, I'm sure it's all wrong, somehow.... I'm sure there's some way that
things could be made happier for women...."

She interrupted the quartette, in her voice a note which Wally had never
heard before and which made him exchange a glance with Helen.

"Now first of all," she said, "just how badly do you four women need your
pay envelopes every week?"

They told her, especially the one who had been crying, and who now
started crying again.

"Wait here a minute, please," said Mary, that note in her voice more
marked than before. She arose and went in the house, and Wally guessed
that she had gone to telephone the factory. For a while they couldn't
hear her, except when she said "I want to speak to Mr. Burdon
Woodward--yes--Mr. Burdon Woodward--"

They could faintly hear her talking then, but toward the end her voice
came full and clear.

"I want you to set them to work again! They are coming right back! Yes,
the four of them! I shall be at the office in the morning. That's all.
Good-bye."

She came out, then, like a young Aurora riding the storm.

"You're to go right back to your work," she said, and in a gentler voice,
"Wally, can I speak to you, please?"

He followed her into the house and when he came out alone ten minutes
later, he drew a deep sigh and sat down again by Helen, a picture of
utter dejection.

"Never mind, Wally," she said, and patted his arm.

"I can't make her out at times," he sighed.

"No