e in
the world, a thousand men are going to turn out as many bearings as a
thousand women!"

"There's one thing more," said the second; "I notice you have raised your
women's wages a dollar a day. Can we tell the men that they are going to
get women's wages?"

They laughed at this inversion of old ideas.

"You can tell them they'll get women's wages," said Mary, "if they can do
women's work!"

But in spite of her smile, for the last few minutes she had become
increasingly conscious of a false note, a forced conclusion in their
plans--had caught glimpses of future hostilities, misunderstandings,
suspicions. The next remark of one of the labour leaders cleared her
thoughts and brought her back face to face with her golden vision.

"The strike was silly--yes," one of the leaders said. "But back of the
men's actions I think I can see the question which disturbed their minds.
If women enter the trades, what are the men going to do? Will there be
work enough for everybody?"

Even before he stopped speaking, Mary knew that she had found herself,
knew that the solid rock was under her feet again.

"There is just so much useful work that has to be done in the world every
day," she said, "and the more hands there are to do it, the quicker it
will get done."

That was as far as she had ever gone before, but now she went a step
farther.

"Let us suppose, for instance, that we had three thousand married men
working here eight hours a day to support their families. If now we allow
three thousand women to come out of those same homes and work side by
side with the men--why, don't you see?--the work could be done in four
hours instead of eight, and yet the same family would receive just the
same income as they are getting now--the only difference being that
instead of the man drawing all the money, he would draw half and his wife
would draw half."

"A four hour day!" said one of the leaders, almost in awe.

"I'm sure it's possible if the women help," said Mary, "and
I know they want to help. They want to feel that they are doing
something--earning something--just the same as a man does. They want to
progress--develop--

"We used to think they couldn't do men's work," she continued. "I used to
think so, myself. So we kept them fastened up at home--something like
squirrels in cages--because we thought housework was the only thing they
could do....

"But, oh, how the war has opened our eyes!...

"There's nothing a man