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Salome Shepard gazed wonderingly at thecrowd of people in the street, as she guidedher pony-phaeton through the factory precincts.

“What can be the matter with these people?”she thought. “I’m sure they ought to havegone to their work before this.”

It was a wet October day. The narrowstreet was slippery with the muddy water thatoozed along to the gutters. The factoryboardinghouses loomed up on either side,dingy and desolate. Even the mills lookedlarger and coarser, in the gloomy air of themorning.

2As she drove by them, the fair owner listenedin vain for the rumble of machinery. Inside,the great, well-lighted rooms looked drearyand barn-like in the gray mist that struggledthrough the windows.

One hour before, the machinery, shriekingand groaning, had voiced the protest of the“hands” against their fancied and their realwrongs. One hour before, every employe hadbeen in his or her place. But the gloom of theatmosphere could not obscure the suppressedexcitement of the morning. Shortsighted andblind to their best interest, they might havebeen; but there was not a man among themwho did not feel a tremendous underlyingprinciple at stake.

And so, at precisely ten o’clock, the machineryhad suddenly and mysteriously stopped, andevery man, woman and child, without a word,had left the mills.

All this had happened while Salome Shepardwas calling on an elderly friend of her mother’sat the other end of the town. It had been adelightfully cosy morning in spite of the rain;and, after a gossipy fashion, they had passedit in discussing, as women will, the newest3pattern of crochet, the last society-novel, thecoming concerts in town.

Salome’s mood was the comfortable one conducedby such soothing intellectual food, asshe set forth on her homeward drive. Therain had ceased, and only along the river didthe mists hover, suggesting to her idle fancythe thick smoke which hangs over a smoulderingfire.

But the fire which had been creeping underthe life of the Shawsheen Mills had but justburst into flames, which mounted higher andhigher as the day wore on.

All through the factory precincts the unwontedexcitement was manifest. Groups ofemployes were everywhere—on the street-corners,in front of tenements and boardinghouses,in the middle of the street;—and allwere engaged in absorbing discussion of oneexciting theme—the strike.

Men without coats or hats; women withshawls thrown loosely over their heads; girls,bonnetless and neglectful of dress; unkemptold women, who were perhaps the home-makersfor these hard-worked and ill-paid people; allwere indifferent save to one subject.

4Even the quick passage, through their midst,of the pony-phaeton and its mistress failed toattract attention beyond an occasional surlyglance from the men or an envious one from thewomen. Unmindful of the long days in store,when there would be ample time to discusstheir wrongs, they remained huddled in excitedgroups in the wet October air, talking overthe strike,—the famous strike of the ShawsheenMills.

“I declare!” muttered the young womanwho was hurrying the pony out of these disagreeablesurroundings; “it must be a strike!Nothing else would crowd them into the streetso. I wonder what they want? Dear me!what nuisances these work-people are. Whycan’t they be sensible, and when they are earninga living, be content? Dear me! if I hadthe making over of this world I would makeeverybody comfortably off, and nobody rich—unlessit were myself,” she added, laughing;for absolute truthfulness was a necessity ofSalome Shepard’s nature, and she knew perfectlywell that she could not do without theluxuries to which she had always been accustomed.

The words repeated themselves in her mind.If any human being has the power of makingover the world in any smallest degree, somethingwhispered, that person must be a young,attractive woman, with a vast property andabsolute control of several hundred people,besides two millions of dollars in her own right.

“Dear me!” she said aloud, as she droveup the graveled road under the dripping yellowbeeches. “How positively dreadful it must beto be a reformer! How would I look in abloomer costume and black bombazine bonnet?No. Let things alone, keep to your sphere,young woman,—the proper, well-regulated,protected and chaperoned sphere of a delicateyoung lady, and let the world right its ownwrongs.”

She jumped lightly from the phaeton, tossingthe reins to James, and showing her fine, well-turnedfigure to excellent advantage as she ranup the broad steps.

The massive doors turned noiselessly at herapproach. She passed through the fine oldhall and went directly up the broad oak staircaseto her room.

6“How comfortable this is,” she said to herself,as the blazing wood-fire threw flickeringshadows over the dainty hangings, the warmrugs and the choice pictures.

But even as she drew a long sigh of contentmentwith her lot, a picture of wet andmuddy streets, thickset with groups of brawnymen and bedraggled, unkempt women, intrudeditself, and the sigh changed its tenor.

“If I only had the making over of theworld!” she said again aloud; and added resolutely,“but I haven’t.”

The Shawsheen Mills had been establishedmany years before the opening of this storyby Salome’s grandfather, Newbern Shepard.They constituted one of the chief manufacturingconcerns of Shepardtown. They mademore cloth, and that of a better quality, thanany other mill outside the “City of Spindles.”They employed a much larger force of operativesthan any other factory in the place, andhad always held a controlling interest in townaffairs.

When the Shawsheen Mills were first started,blooming girls from all parts of Massachusettscame swarming to them, glad of a new andrespectable employment,—came with earnestpurpose to make this new life and its outcomessubservient to a better future. The conscientiousNew England girl of those days took as8much pride in making a perfect web of clothas though it were for her own wearing. Awarethat her employers took an interest in her welfare,aside from the fact that she was a part ofthe motive power of the mill, she rewardedthem with a full performance of her duty. Amutual goodfellowship had existed, then, betweenemployer and employed in the yearswhen old Newbern Shepard was at the headof his mills.

All this had changed. Newbern Shepardhad died after a long and successful career,leaving the business to his son, Floyd Shepard.The latter, educated at Harvard, with five yearsof study afterward in Germany, had developedlittle taste for an active business life such ashis father had led. He had, consequently,placed the entire business in the hands of OtisGreenough, a friend of his college-days and ahard-headed business man. Floyd Shepardhad idled the greater part of his time beforereaching the age of fifty in various parts ofthe world.

Then he came home, married a Baltimorebelle, and passed his old age in his nativeplace.

9Even then, he gave little thought to thedetails of business. He added to and improvedthe home of his forefathers, until hishouse and grounds were acknowledged to be thefinest in the state. After four years of marriedlife, his young wife died, leaving him one child—ababe of three days. Then he retired intohis study, and lived only among his books.

“Don’t trouble me with the business,” hewould say to Otis Greenough, on the rareoccasions when it seemed necessary to consultthe owner of the mills. “I care nothing as tohow you manage the works, and know lesshow it should be done. Suit yourself as todetails, and keep the mills paying a good profit.I shall be satisfied.”

Upon this principle the mills had been runfor thirty years. The agent and his superintendentshad devoted themselves to the problemof getting out more goods and makingmore money than their competitors, while keepingthe standard of their wares up to its oldmark. They had no time for the problem ofhuman life involved. The first and principalquestion had required a severe struggle, withactive brains and sharp wits. What wonder,10then, that the increasing mass of operativeshad come to be considered, every year, less ashuman beings in need of help and encouragement,and more as mechanical attachments ofthe mills?

Only such operatives as had been broughtup in the mills realized the difference. Theemployes were mostly of the unwashed population,expecting nothing but a place to earntheir living and but scanty pay for it.

Having, at the outset, no confidence in theiremployers, and no feeling of goodwill towardsthem, they had no conscientious motive behindtheir work. On the contrary, they stood onthe defensive, watching for oppression andtyranny, and ready to take arms against them.

This was the state of things when the firstregularly organized strike occurred at theShawsheen Mills.

Otis Greenough, although an old man, wasstill at the head of the mills. Floyd Shepard’sdeath three years before had made no differencewith the vast business interests in his name.In willing everything he owned to his daughter,who was already heiress to a large fortunefrom her mother’s family, he had provided that11Otis Greenough should be chief agent duringthe remainder of his life; and that the millsshould continue on the same plan by whichthey had been run for the past quarter of acentury.

Otis Greenough was an arbitrary man, withthat enormous strength of will which a manmust have who is to control and manage twothousand people and an increasing business.

If, in the march of economic progress, hechose to make changes in the machinery of themills, he consulted no one, and cared nothingfor the black looks or surly mutterings of theoperative who might fancy himself injuredthereby. Had it been hinted to him that hisoperatives might be trained to take a personalinterest in the success or failure of new experimentsor, indeed, that they had any right to hisbrotherly consideration, he would have floutedthe idea.

It was his boast that he never wasted wordson the operatives. In short, he was as indifferentto the rights of Labor as his Lancashirespinners were to the interests of Capital. Hencethe strike.

At noon of the day that Salome Shepard12had driven through the factory street, OtisGreenough sat in his private office with histwo superintendents, the treasurer and cashierof the mills, and one or two subordinates. Asthe bell struck for twelve, five men from thevarious departments filed in and presented awritten document. They were the committeeappointed by the new Labor Union.

Mr. Greenough took the paper with an airthat showed him to be in anything but aconciliatory mood. Without opening it, heburst forth angrily:

“What, in the name of common sense, isthis farce anyhow? What do you mean byleaving your work and presuming to come here,dictating terms tome?”

“The paper will explain everything, sir,”replied the foremost of the committee. “Wehave our rights—or should have them. Thetime has come when we propose to get them.Will you read the petition, sir?”

“No,” thundered the choleric old man. “Notin your presence. Villard, treat with them.”Mr. Greenough was too angry to say more.

13“I think,” he said, “that you had betterleave us for a time. We shall need to consideryour proposals, whatever they may be.Go now, and come again later—say at fouro’clock.” Agreeing to this proposition, thefive men turned and left the office. Mr. Villardsat down again, waiting for the agent to speak.

“The confounded whelps!” ejaculated Mr.Greenough, as soon as he could find breath.“Open that paper, Villard—the impudentpuppies!”

Without answering, John Villard tore openthe envelope, and read the document aloud:

Whereas, we, the undersigned, believing that our interestsdemand an organization which shall promote and protectaffairs relating to us as laboring men; and

Whereas, we have already organized and maintained such asociety; it is now unanimously agreed that we insist upon therecognition of such a body by our employers, and upon theirmaking certain concessions for the benefit of that body.

Whereas, there is a ten-hour system established in this stateby law; we herebyresolve that we will refuse to work ten anda half or eleven hours a day as has been demanded of us.

Whereas, we believe the introduction of the new frames aredetrimental to the interests of the mule-spinners; weresolvethat they must be taken out, and the old mules replaced, witha written agreement that no more of the obnoxious machineryshall be added for, at least, five years.

Whereas, there has been an attempt made to reduce ourwages, especially in the weaving department; we herebyresolve that we will submit to no curtailment of wages, and to14demand payment of all wages weekly, as is the custom incertain other mills in this state.

Trusting that these our petitions may be granted, our rightsrespected, and that harmonious relations will soon be establishedbetween us, we take pleasure in signing ourselves

Before John Villard had finished readingthe paper, Mr. Greenough had risen and waspacing the floor excitedly.

“Shocking!” he exclaimed, as Mr. Villardfolded the paper and returned it to its envelope.“Preposterous! Do they think they canimpose upon me with such a jumble of unreasoningnonsense as that? Labor Union, indeed!Why, the rascals act as if there wereno interests but those of labor. And a beautifultime they’ve taken to strike—when ordersare pouring in faster than we can possibly keepup with them. A fine time, indeed!”

“I suppose,” said John Villard, fearlessly,“there seems a slight injustice to them, in cuttingdown their wages at such a time.”

“What right have they to dictate, I shouldlike to inquire?” answered the irate agent.“If they were not a bigoted, unreasoning set,they’d know they never can serve the interestsof labor in such a way. They’d realize that15they are only biting off their own noses! Theyhave probably been worked upon by somecrank of an agitator. If they were not ignorantdogs, they’d know that they could bestserve the interests of labor by being faithful tothose of capital. Why,” he concluded, hisface growing redder in his wrath, “is thisAmerica? Is this our boasted New England?Is this a free country? By Jove! I’ve heardof this sort of thing in England, but in thisrepublican land, this boasted region of freedom—GreatScott! What are we coming to?”

“It’s this accursed trades-unionism creepingin among us,” put in the treasurer’s mild voice,as Otis Greenough paused for breath. “I’vebeen expecting it.”

“Blast it, why didn’t you mention it then?”returned Mr. Greenough. But the treasurerretired in confusion behind his books and didnot answer.

“Well, Villard,” continued the agent, “Ihope now you will give up the Utopian schemesyou’ve been nursing for the elevation of thelaboring classes. You see just what a foolish,unthinking, unreliable set of men we have todeal with.”

16“On the contrary, sir,” returned the secondsuperintendent, firmly, “I sympathize, to adegree, with them. I agree that they havetaken an inopportune time to enforce theirviews, and regret that they could not have seenfit to keep at work while their petition wasbeing considered; and I would advise——”

“I want no man’s advice until I ask it,”interrupted the elder man. “This is our firststrike, and it shall be the last so long as I haveauthority here. Humph! They think theycan intimidate me! They have chosen thistime because they think Imust yield now.They little know me. Otis Greenough has notrun the Shawsheen Mills successfully thirtyyears, to be brow-beaten and conquered in theend by a pack of ignorant laborers.”

“But how is this to end?” asked the firstsuperintendent, speaking for the first time.

“It can end whenever these men will takeback their impudent paper and go to work.Villard, when they show up again—four o’clockdid you say?—you will tell them so. Offerthem a chance to go to work to-morrow morningon the old terms. You needn’t give in to themone inch. Do you hear? Not a jot or tittle.”

“Why, advertise. Advertise far and near.Get new help. We’ll open the mills and runthem, too, right in their very teeth. I’ll showthem that he who has been master here forthirty years is master until he dies.”

The choleric agent’s blood was fairly up,and he now set himself to plan for the comingwarfare. When the committee from the laborunion made its appearance at four o’clock, theagent refused to treat directly with them. Heretired to his inner office, whence issued amoment later an “open letter to the employesof the Shawsheen Mills.” The circular wascomposed and written entirely by himself, andwas quite characteristic of his high-handedauthority. It stated that “as the control ofan owner over his property was guaranteedby the law of the land, and was of such unquestionablecharacter as ought not to bemeddled with by any other individual or combinationof individuals, the agent of the ShawsheenMills, acting for their owner, would brookno such interference as had been attempted.”19But, in bombastic language, he went on to saythat, on account of the pressure of work, heoffered to take back into the mills such operativesas, after a day’s idleness and a night’scalm reflection, might decide to come backpeacefully, and accept the old conditions. Thecircular closed by adding that all returningoperatives must renounce their connection withthe new Labor Union, and stating that theShawsheen Mills would be immediately re-opened.

This letter, as might have been expected,only served to fan the smouldering embers ofdiscord. It was taken at once to the quartersof the new Union, and angrily discussed. Astormy meeting was held that evening, andscores of new members were added to the organization,all unanimously agreeing, not only tokeep away from the mills themselves, but toprevent other operatives from entering them.The trouble which might have been met at theoutset and subdued by candid discussion and afair acknowledgment on each side of the claimsof the other, was changed into a barricade ofdanger between labor and capital over whicha battle was to be fought, involving money and20credit and losses on one side, and daily breadfor two thousand people on the other.

“Come,” said Otis Greenough, emerging fromhis “den” after the committee had left theoffice. “I want you, Villard, and you, too,Burnham,” he added, turning to the othersuperintendent, “to go with me this evening,to the owner of these mills, and lay before herthe proceedings of the day, and our reasons fortaking a firm stand. Although, precious littledifference it will make with her, I imagine, howmany strikes we have, until her income isaffected! Will you be so good as to state,Villard, what you are smiling at.”

“I was thinking, sir, that it is a queer stateof affairs, when a person owning large and influentialmills like these, need not know of thestrike or be consulted with regard to it, until itis half over,” answered Villard. He had nofear of the agent, with whom he was a favorite,in spite of his seeming harshness. “It seemsto me, if I were a young woman, with unlimitedleisure and wealth, I should care to knowsomething of so tremendous an interest as theShawsheen Mills represent—that is, if I ownedthem.”

21“Ha, ha!” laughed the agent, “that showshow much of a ladies’ man you are, John.Much you know about the things that interestand amuse the young ladies. By Jove! Ishould laugh to see the daughter of FloydShepard meddling with the details of the greatbusiness he left her. She could discuss Frenchand Italian literature, or the different schoolsof music and art, by the hour, and fairly inundateyou with a flood of learning; but when itcomes to mills—why, she don’t know a loomfrom a spinning-jenny—and don’t want to.I’m only going up there as a matter of form.As for advice, she knows I wouldn’t take it,even if she has any to offer. But courtesy—propercourtesy,” and Otis Greenough drewhimself up to his fullest height, “and the respectwe owe her as the owner of this property, demandthat we go there this evening. I will call foryou in my carriage at half-past seven.”

“I reckon the old man is about right,” saidBurnham, when they were alone. “MissShepard knows no more about the practicalaffairs of her mill, than that little white kittenover there does. She’ll meet us with a listless,22half-bored air, pretending to listen to the statementsof our chief, and all the time be wishingus at the antipodes.”

“Do you know,” interrupted John Villard,locking the door to the office as they left ittogether, “I’ve very little patience withwomen of that sort. Think, with her youthand health and money, what a directing,reforming force in bringing together the conflictinginterests of labor and capital she mightbe! Great Heavens! I wish I had her opportunity.I’d make something of it.”

“Oh, you are too Utopian,” replied Burnham.“It is fortunate she isn’t that kind. Weshould be overwhelmed with Schemes for theAmelioration of the Condition of This, That,and The Other Thing, until there would benothing left but bankruptcy for all of us. No.I want no reformers in petticoats at the headof the Shawsheen Mills. But here I am at mystreet. Good-bye, till evening.”

Salome Shepard passed a dull afternoon.Although a young woman of resources shefound herself in no mood to enjoy any of themafter lunch. The newest volume of essaysseemed insufferably dull, and she turned for23relief to the latest novel; but, in spite of thefact that this book was talked about throughoutthe country, she soon threw it aside with awearied air and sat gazing into the blazinghickory fire.

Strange! but the red-hot coals formed themselvesinto a group against the dull back-loglike the groups of miserable, excited men andwomen of the morning against a backgroundof rain and fog and muddy streets. It was anuncomfortable picture, and she rose suddenly,and, going into the music-room, seated herselfat the piano. Chopin’s Nocturnes stood openon the rack, but she tossed them aside andbegan some stormy Liszt music, breaking offwhen half done and going to the window.

The rain had begun to fall again and thefog had settled like a pall over everythingfarther off than the arched gateway. Shewondered if all those people were still standingin the mud and rain.

Salome ran forward, pushed her aunt’s favoritechair into the position she liked best, andput her into it.

24“Why did you stop playing? And why didyou attempt that brilliant thing?” said Mrs.Soule. “You are so dreadfully out of practice,you know.”

“It wasn’t that,” answered the youngerwoman; “I’m not in the mood for playing anything.I doubt if I could get through with‘Bounding Billows’ or the ‘Fifteenth Amusement’to-day. Did you know, aunty, thereis a strike down at the mills?”

“Why, the operatives, of course. I don’tknow why, or anything about it. I have nevershown any interest in the mills,” she went oneagerly and half-apologetically, “but I shouldlike to know what it is all about—why they didit—what they want, and all that. I shouldthink Mr. Greenough would come up here.”

“He will come as soon as he deems itproper.” Mrs. Soule’s voice was calmness andprecision itself. “It is not nice for youngladies to mix themselves up in such commonthings.”

“But, aunty,” laughed Salome, “strikes arenot common things here. We never had one25before. And I am not so very young a ladyas to need the same careful guardianship Ihad when I was sixteen. I am twenty-sevenyears old.”

“There is no need of saying so upon alloccasions, if you are,” replied her aunt withsome asperity. “A strike, like all things connectedwith, or originated by the ignorant laboringclass, is common in the sense of beingvulgar. Any woman, young or old, broughtup as delicately and carefully as you havebeen, demeans herself by connection with suchthings. You have an agent—a manly andcapable one; leave the settlement of suchthings to him.”

“Oh, I’m not going to meddle with the strike.The very suggestion that I would wish to haveanything to do with settling the difficultymakes me laugh.”

Salome rose and began to pace the room.“But sometimes, lately, aunty, it has occurredto me that a young woman of average talent,with a great business on her hands which employstwo thousand people, may have somethingto do in life more than to seek her ownselfish enjoyment—a pursuit which, after all,26is not elevating and leaves but a restless, unsatisfiedspirit in its wake. I came acrosssome of grandfather’s manuscripts two or threeweeks ago and have been reading them. Hewasn’t like papa. The mills were a part of hisvery self. The operatives were almost like somany children to him. I’ve read in his, and inother books, about the mill-girls of his day.Girls whose working days began at daylight inwinter and ended at half-past seven in theevening; who had only two dresses to theirbacks, and those of Merrimack print; whoseprofits for a week, after their board was paid,were only two dollars. But girls who coulddiscuss Shakespeare, Dante, and Milton at theirlooms; who read Locke and Abercrombie andPollock and Young (something I can’t do!);who sent petitions to Congress for the abolitionof slavery; who helped build churches fromtheir pitiful savings; who wrote essays andpoems and stories, even while running theirlooms; who spent their evenings in the studyof German and French and botany; andwho went out, at last, to become teachers andmothers and missionaries, and, above all, noble,self-sacrificing, helpful women. And I tell you27that, with all my money and my polishededucation, I envy them.”

“Salome, really, you surprise me,” exclaimedthe excellent lady who was listening to her.“Calm yourself, my dear.”

“Look at the girls in this mill—in my grandfather’smill to-day—in my mill,” she wenton. “Beings of bangs and bangles and cheapjewelry, of low aspirations, and correspondinglylow morals! They are not to blame fortheir penny-dreadful lives, because they knowno better. They dream of nothing higher thantheir looms and their face-powder, and theircheap satins and false hair—why should they?They see rich and educated women like uswrapped entirely in ourselves, each anxious tooutshine the rest, and all seemingly lost in themad race after fashionable attire. They donot know, poor things, that we ever think ortalk of higher subjects. I tell you, I feel thatI am, somehow, responsible for them. And yet,I don’t know how to help them. My grandfathercould, but I can’t.”

“I know nothing of such things,” coldlyreplied her aunt. “It is not ladylike to flyinto a passion over the fancied wrongs of a28lower order of beings. I beg that you willrecollect that you are the daughter of Cora LeBourdillon and Floyd Shepard.”

“And more than that,” Salome whispered toherself as she sought the quiet of her ownroom, “I am afraid I am the grand-daughterof Newbern Shepard.”

It was nearly eight o’clock when carriage-wheelswere heard coming up the graveleddrive-way, and Otis Greenough and his associateswere announced. Salome and her auntwere sitting in the music-room, and came forwardat once; the former with an unmistakableair of eagerness.

“Tell me about the strike, Mr. Greenough,”she asked, before he had fairly seated himself.

“I saw something of it this morning, drivingthrough the town. I could not help knowingwhat it was. But why did they do it? Whatdo they want?”

“They did it,” and Otis Greenough sat upwith a judicial air, “because they are rascallydogs, and do not know when they are well off.And they want?—well,—the earth—more pay,30shorter hours, and the Lord knows what besides.”

“To be sure, I know very little of thesethings, practically, although I have taken theprescribed doses of social economy in my readingsunder Professor Townsend,” she went on;“but it has occurred to me, within a few days,that the laboring classes have very little controlover their own lives, and are not much morethan slaves to us who hold the reins ofpower.”

“Bless me!” thought Otis Greenough, staringat her. If his office-door had suddenlyspoken, offering him officious counsel as tohis method of conducting the mills, he couldhardly have been more surprised. “Bless me!No Floyd Shepard about her.”

“If the operatives are poorly paid, and weare making more money than ever before (Ithink I understood you so the other day?),”the young woman was saying, “why shouldn’ttheir wages be raised? It seems but fair, tome.”

31“Much you know about it, little girl,” Mr.Greenough found voice to say, addressing heras he used to in by-gone days, when she occasionallystrayed into the mills and teased to betaken through them. “Much any young ladyof the world can know of such matters. Wewould not have you turn from being your owncharming self, and become a learned blue-stocking,or bloomered reformer; but there aremany, many reasons which come between thequestions of profit and loss, and the petty detailsof operatives’ wages, which cannot be explainedto you here and now. They were contentedenough until some rascal or other, havingbecome imbued with the spirit of these laborunions starting up all over the country, mustneeds organize one here. By Jove! I’ll employdetectives and hunt out the disturbingelements and shut them up. I have offeredevery mother’s son a chance to go back to workto-morrow morning, on condition that he dropsthis union business; but I am told to-nightthat not one of them will accept. Ignorantcreatures! I’ll show ’em what it means tofight a rich and strong concern like this, in thevain hope of bringing us to their terms.”

32“Meanwhile,” it was Villard who spoke,“we are to go on resisting their combinedignorance and impatience, and perhaps worseelements, losing thousands of dollars in thewarfare, are we?”

“Yes, rather than give in one inch to them,”answered Mr. Greenough. “This is the firstorganized strike and must be made a warningto future disturbers. It’s those confoundedEnglishmen trying to transplant their foreignideas to American soil. If we give in to themnow, we establish a bad precedent.”

“I must confess,” said Villard, “that I donot see it. I have seen several strikes, andknow that generally both sides lose sight ofreason, and determine to fight it out regardlessof cost. I am afraid, with the course you proposeto adopt, sir, that we shall go on until thelosses on our side or the suffering and privationon theirs will become unbearable; and thenone side or the other will be forced to yield.If it should be they, a smouldering resentmentwill be left, ready to break out anew atthe first convenient season. If we, theywill feel encouraged to try still more arbitrarymeasures in the future. Or if a compromise33be effected, it will be one that might as well bemade to-morrow.”

“You talk well for a young man,” admittedMr. Greenough. “How did you come by yourexceedingly humane and sympathetic views?”

“I began as an employe myself,” answeredVillard, “and I know how they feel to someextent. I know what it is to work at the lowestdrudgery of a mill, and can imagine how itmust seem to have no hope of ever rising to ahigher position. Hard, unremitting toil, longhours with endless years of hopeless work inprospect, the lowest possible wages, a large andrapidly increasing family, with perhaps an agedparent or invalid wife to support—I tell youlots of those fellows have all that to bear, knowingthe utter impossibility of ever saving anything,or of raising their own condition. I say,sir, looking at life from their standpoint, it’smighty hard.”

“Well, well,” put in Mr. Greenough, testily,“a great many of them want nothing better.They would not know what to do with a betterchance for life, as you call it, if they had it.”

“Simply put yourself in their place, sir,”said Villard. “What if you were forty years34younger than you are, and condemned to a lifeof toil at the looms, for instance, would you notclaim the right to combine with others of likeoccupation and interests and ask for a betterchance? These men of ours have taken anunreasonable way of asserting themselves, butI think they are entitled to our respect, andshould be dealt with as men. An open, fairdiscussion of the wage question or the ten-hourlaw can result in nothing but good for bothsides.”

“You are young,” Mr. Greenough replied,“and believe everything in this world can bemade to run exactly as you want it. Whenyou are older, you’ll realize better the indifferenceand general mulishness of the world, andof operatives in particular. I do not believe inmeeting and deferring to them as equals. Theyare not worth our efforts, and so long as theyare under the influence of hot-headed devilswho pose as labor reformers, just so long weare going to see trouble.”

“If we were to make a fair compromise withthem,” Mr. Burnham was speaking for thefirst time, “and let them see that we, ashumane employers, have a greater desire for35their interest than any foreigner can have,wouldn’t it work a reaction in our favor? Froma strictly business point of view, perhaps itwould be money in our pockets.”

“Yes,” urged Villard, “if we were to showourselves willing to consider an intimate knowledgeof their needs and thus prove ourselvestheir best friends, it would be only a case ofpractical philanthropy, and one which wouldraise our profits every year, I believe. It isonly the first step that costs, you know.”

“I don’t believe it,” stoutly maintained theagent. “In my day there has been very littletalk of managers and owners deferring to theirhelp. I hire my own operatives and reserve theright to raise, or lower, their wages as I please.”

“But, Mr. Greenough,” broke in Salomeeagerly, “don’t you consider their circumstancesat all? Don’t you, for instance, in a drivingtime, pay them any higher wages than in dulltimes? I think there would be nothing butfairness in that.”

“My dear young lady,” was the answer inpatronizing tones, “don’t bother your brainswith such things. You cannot understandthem. Why try?”

36“Imagine our Salome posing as a philanthropistor a social economist,” interrupted Mrs.Soule’s mellifluous tones. “We had a greatlaugh over the idea this afternoon.”

“I think,” continued her aunt in the samesmooth accents, “that we have talked businesslong enough. I am sure, Mr. Greenough, thatSalome is, and will be perfectly satisfied withany course you may see fit to adopt withregard to the strikers. Women, you know,ladies at least, have no heads for business, andwe, certainly,” with an indescribable turn ofvoice on the “we”—“we, certainly, have hadno training to fit us for reformers. And nowshall we not have some music? Salome, dear,will you play that delightful little suite ofMoscowzki’s that I like so well?”

The young woman rose and, going to thepiano, did as she was bid, although somewhatmechanically. Then Mr. Greenoughproposed a song from Mr. Burnham, who possesseda fine baritone voice, and the eveningwore away with music and light conversation.

When the three men went home, the elder37was in fine spirits, in spite of having beenshocked and discomfited to an unusual degree,by the unexpected disclosure of views which hetermed “strong-minded” on the part of thefair owner of the Shawsheen Mills.

“If there should come to be hard times andperhaps destitution among the operatives beforethis difficulty is settled,” Salome said to JohnVillard as he was preparing to go, “such destitutionas we read of in foreign countries intimes of labor disturbances, I hope you willlet me do something to relieve it. Strange asit may seem, I have a much better idea ofsuch a state of affairs there than here—amongmy own mills.”

“There will be no such state of affairs, Itrust,” was his reply, “as is pictured in Englishnovels.”

“You have guessed accurately as to thesources of my information,” she laughed.

“Meanwhile, if we pursue the policy proposed,”and he glanced at Mr. Greenough, whowas making gallant speeches to Mrs. Soule,“you might keep a watchful eye on the help.You could tell, you know, by the women, if they38came to absolute distress. Of course, there is noknowing how long this thing may last.”

“Me! You look to me for such a thing,” andit was hard to tell whether her tone was amusedor sarcastic only. “Why, Mr. Villard, I donot know one of the operatives in the mills—noteven by sight. If I were to meet them onthe main thoroughfare to-morrow I shouldnot know them from other women of theirclass.”

John Villard raised his eyebrows and turnedto put on his coat without another word. Thesituation was incomprehensible to him.

Salome saw this, and winced under it. Shemade no further attempt at conversation, butsaid good-night graciously to Mr. Greenoughand the older superintendent, recognizingVillard’s parting nod at the door.

“There,” said her aunt, as they went backinto the firelight, “I hope they won’t feel itnecessary to come here and consult with usagain so long as the strike is on. As thoughyou knew or cared anything for it, my dear!But, of course, they had to come as a matterof form. Any way, I’m glad it is over. Playsomething.”

39Salome complied, playing the first thingwhich came to her mind—the opening bars oftheSonata Pathetique.

“I wish,” she said to herself as she disrobedfor the night, “that I were a capable womanof affairs—and that John Villard were myagent.”

Not for a week could enough new help behired to even make a show of opening theShawsheen Mills. Labor Unions were a comparativelynew thing in this country, and werenot so thoroughly organized as now; and afew of the old operatives, rather than starve,were glad to go back into the mills on anycondition. But the great majority refusedwith indignation to give up their claims, andproceeded to “make things hot,” as theyexpressed it, for the “scabs” and “mudsills.”

Work was attempted in the mills, althoughmany looms stood silent and the spinning-muleswere entirely deserted. Thread for warp wasprocured from a neighboring city at no smallexpense and the mills were run at a loss, toprove the agent’s assertion that “he would41show them who was manager of the ShawsheenMills.”

This sort of thing was kept up four days.On the fifth morning, the operatives went asusual to the mill, but the machinery, after afew insufficient groans, gave up in despair andsettled into utter quiet.

There was a great hurrying to and fro, anda close examination of belts and machinery.Word was soon brought up from the basement.The engines had been tampered with; on eachof them the belts had been cut. The jocularlyinclined said the “engines had joinedthe Union;”—while everybody wonderedwhat effect this stroke would have on the agent.

The premises were examined and the night-watchmanquestioned. Evidently the deed hadbeen done by some one familiar with the place,but there was not the slightest clue. He haddone well his work, and the mills were stoppedfor repairs.

Otis Greenough blustered about and cursedthe whole business; but he was farther thanever from a compromise, declaring that hewould yet beat them with their own weapons.

42The night-watch was doubled and the millswere opened again the next day. But the employerswere fighting a desperate party and littlecalculated their strength. The man who hadsucceeded so well in his first attempt to stop themills risked himself again; and on the secondmorning the machinery again refused to start.This time a small wheel had been removedfrom each engine and carried away. Thewater-wheel had long been in partial disuse andcould not be trusted without the engines.Hence, there was nothing to be done but to stopagain for repairs. This time it was a weekbefore the engines were in running order.And yet, not a word passed between the agentand the strikers.

The night-watch were discharged and newones engaged. A special police was secured topatrol the mill-yard, and when the mills wereagain opened, it was with the avowed determinationto keep them going in spite of everyearthly power.

The next morning, notwithstanding thepositive assertions of police and night-watchthat no one had been near the mills, everyband connecting the looms to the machinery43above was cut in half a dozen places. Thenthe superstitious operatives whispered amongthemselves that unseen agencies were linkedwith the Union, and that the strikers mustsucceed in the end; and many of the faintheartedwent over to the new labor party.

“It is of no use trying to run the mills in thisway,” said Mr. Burnham. “We have alreadylost several thousand dollars. We must compromise.”

“Never,” said Mr. Greenough. “The termsof Floyd Shepard’s will grant me absolutepower here, and so long as I live, it shall neverbe said that an educated, trained and levelheadedbusiness man was overcome by a lotof ignorant bullies and agitators. These LaborUnions all over the State need an example.There is money enough in the mill treasury tofight them until they starve themselves out.No other mill or corporation about here willhire them, and it is only a matter of weeksor months when absolute poverty forces themto yield. Not one inch will I give in to them.They shall come back as beggars, glad toaccept work at even lower wages than theyhave ever had. I’ll teach them a lesson.”

44Geoffrey Burnham turned away full of angerthat a flourishing business should be destroyedby one man’s obstinacy. John Villard wentback to the silent looms, full of righteousindignation, not only at the total disregard ofpractical business interests, but at the want ofhumanity and philanthropy and Christian charity,which by his subordinate position he mustseem to countenance.

Weeks lengthened themselves into months,and still the Shawsheen Mills were closed.

Salome Shepard, after spending the holidayseason with friends in New York, came home,satiated with social success, and a little tired ofthe endless pursuit of pleasure. Still the millslay idle and Otis Greenough refused to talk anymore with her on the subject of the strike.And the terms of her father’s will held herpowerless, even had she chosen to exercise herauthority.

But she chafed under the knowledge thattwo thousand people, who were in a sense dependentupon her for their daily bread, wereout of work in the midst of a hard winter.

One day she went to walk down among thepeople who were suffering, now, for a principle.

45She was amazed at the gaunt, hungry lookof the old men; and self-accused at thepinched and wan faces of the few children whoplayed in the narrow streets. Unthinking, shehad put on a seal-skin cloak. It was a coldday, and furs, to her, were only a naturalaccompaniment to the frosts of winter.

But going down the uncared-for side-walk,she rebuked herself, noting the single shawland calico dress of an old woman who waswearily making her way a few paces in frontof her. Presently the woman stopped, seizedwith a paroxysm of coughing.

Salome came up with her, and looked intothe white face, which told of hard times.

“Madam,” she said, respectfully, “can I beof any assistance to you? Shall I not helpyou home?”

Her tone and manner were exactly the sameshe would have used to any of her aunt’sfriends. It did not occur to her to be patronizingor condescending.

“Yes’m,” she said, presently. “I live upto the other end of the street. If the cough46wasn’t so bad, an’ my side didn’t ketch meso! But if I can git back to my own chairag’in——”

Another fit of coughing seized her, andinterrupted the “garrulousness of unculturedold age.” Salome waited until she got breathagain and then took her by the arm, accommodatingher steps to the feebler ones.

Here and there a surprised face peeredcuriously at her through a dirty window, knowingwho she was, and wondering that she condescendedto walk with old Granny Lancaster.Everywhere a general air of poverty, perhapsof actual hunger, impressed this woman, whohad inherited the tumble-down tenement houseson each side.

“I beg your pardon,” she said, “but do youeat nourishing food enough? Good beef-steakand roast-beef would help your cough morethan medicine.”

“Beef-steak and roast-beef ain’t for the likeso’ me,” she said. “Meat of any kind ain’t forus in times o’ strikes. May the Lord abovesend us oatmeal enough to keep us through47till the mills open ag’in is all I ask. Here’s myhouse. Much ’bleeged, lady.”

Salome wanted to go inside the rickety olddoor and follow the woman up the dirty stairway,but she did not say so, and the old womanhobbled up the steps without asking her in.

Salome felt impulsively in her pocket, anddrawing out her porte-monnaie, emptied itscontents into the dirty, emaciated palm ofGranny Lancaster. Then she turned andwalked rapidly back home.

“My dear,” he said, after an hour or twopassed in desultory conversation, “may I begthat you will keep away from the operatives?Impulsive and injudicious charity does themmore harm than anything else. No doubt thepart of Lady Bountiful seems a pleasant anddesirable one, but, just now, you are not fittedfor it.”

“For instance,” he went on, “the moneyyou gave a certain old woman on the corporationyesterday was taken by her son-in-lawlast night, and furnished him an opportunity48for a glorious old drunk. I beg yourpardon for using their phraseology. He wasarrested before morning for drunkenness anddisorderly conduct.”

“I do not comprehend,” she stammered.“The woman said they had no meat. She wasactually suffering for nourishing food. I gavethe money, impulsively it is true, but thatthey need not go hungry.”

“Now, you see, my dear,” he answered,“just how much encouragement one gets intrying to do anything for the laboring classes.They turn upon you and use the goodness ofyour heart and your generous motives to dragthemselves down to a lower depth of degradation.Good-day, my dear, and don’t be ledaway by your feelings.”

Salome stood looking after him, heart-sickand discouraged. The world—her part of it,at least—was all wrong, and she, with plentyof money and an awakening desire to help, waspowerless. She ordered the pony phaetonagain and started for a drive. She obeyed asudden impulse to go through the factory precincts.There were evidences of a suppressedexcitement. Knots of desperate-looking men49stood about. But they hushed their voices asshe drew near, and stood in sullen silence asshe passed.

“There is evidently something in the wind,”she thought, urging the pony to quicken hispace.

She did not know that the committee fromthe Labor Union had that morning made athird attempt to treat with her agent andfailed.

“I’ll send for Marion Shaw,” she said toherself, on her way home an hour later. “Sheis a practical, sensible, business-like woman.Perhaps she will know of some way to help meto help others. And she needs rest.”

This idea so inspired her that she arrivedhome quite elated, and stated her plan to Mrs.Soule at dinner-time with much animation.

But later in the evening, the groups of menshe had seen on “the corporation” came backto her mind and caused her a certain feeling ofuneasiness. What had they been talking aboutso excitedly as she drew near?

It was one of those suddenly warm nightsin January that succeed, in our fickle climate,50a bitter cold day, and Salome felt an unaccountabledesire to be in the open air. She threwon a warm wrap and hood, and saying nothing,went out on the piazza, and crossed the lawnto a favorite walk of hers in summer—a pathunder a long group of fir-trees down by thestreet at the back of the house.

“Sh—sh! not so loud,” replied the other.“It’s all right, and better than we expected.”

“Because,” the first was saying, “the oldman himself has gone down to the mill.”

“Yes. What on earth possessed him? Butthen that’s none of our affairs. If he wants torun the risk of losing his life—that’s hisbusiness, not mine.”

“Well, but,” and the first voice had a timid51note, “that’s going too far—we were only toblow up the mill—not to kill anybody.”

“Can’t help that. Fifteen minutes more,if everything works well, and old man Greenough’sday is over. Jim’s just about lightingthe fuse, I reckon, now. It’s an awfullong one, but the fire’ll creep round there intime.”

The voices grew fainter and ceased altogether,only the dull sound of the men’s footstepsreaching her as they passed down the hill awayfrom the grounds.

Salome stood an instant, rooted to the spot.What was this horrible thing she had heard?

“Fifteen minutes more, if everything workswell, and old man Greenough’s day is over.”

The whole plot flashed across her bewilderedbrain. She dashed through the back-gate anddown the deserted street towards the mills. It52was a ten minutes’ walk across that way, but sheran,—flew,—tore down the lonely road in lessthan half that time.

Otis Greenough might be an unreasonable,hot-headed, obstinate agent, but he was herfather’s friend and had loved and petted herwhen she was a motherless child.

Under the office window most likely, sincethey knew that the old agent was in there.

She came in sight of that window. Therewas a dim light there. All else was dark.The south wind moaned dismally.

She hurried faster and came nearer the officewindow. Under it was another window with abroken pane, from which hung something sheinstantly divined as the fuse.

She had been sewing on some dainty trifle53earlier in the evening, and a pair of smallscissors still hung at her waist.

Closer drew the spark of fire to the brokenwindow pane, whence it would disappear to workits fearful errand. It seemed to twinkle andmock at her in fiendish delight. She graspedthe jutting window-frame and jumped upon thebroad sill.

Thank God, she had it at last. One snip ofher scissors, and the spark of fire dropped harmlesslyto the ground. She turned slightly tostep off the window-ledge. Her foot slippedand she fell, a white, faint heap upon theground.

When she opened her eyes again, not onlyOtis Greenough but John Villard and an office-boywere bending anxiously over her.

“My dear girl,” the agent was saying, “blessme, my dear, what is it? How came you hereand who has harmed you?”

“Don’t be alarmed, sir,” was her reply, asshe got on her feet; and then, somewhatexcitedly, she told the events of the last fifteenor twenty minutes, interrupted, every othersentence, by such ejaculations as, “Great Scott,”“Bless me,” “The rascals,” “Confound them,”from the elderly man, while the younger onelistened in silent amazement.

Rapid search was made and the night-watchwas found sleeping, in a stupor which was evidentlythe work of a drug; while the policewere, as usual, nowhere to be found.

55Salome was taken into the office—not withoutinward trembling, as she feared furtherevidences of the miscreants.

Mr. Villard soon reported two kegs of gunpowderand a small dynamite bomb in theroom below, at the same time congratulating,most heartily, the young woman who had savedtheir lives as well as the mills.

But her courage was now at a low ebb, and,woman-like, she shivered at the close proximityof gunpowder, and begged to be taken home.

Mr. Greenough, who had come to realize thedanger to himself and to the mills which hisobstinacy had provoked, was also anxious to leavethe premises and glad to accompany Salomehome.

John Villard, meanwhile, attended to theduty of finding new watchmen who should bereliable,—a difficult task. Against his will, hepromised Salome not to sleep at the mills, as hehad been doing since the machinery had beentampered with.

Salome was nearly prostrated when shereached home, and had but little strength leftwith which to importune the agent to consentto any terms for a settlement; but as the old56man was, for once, thoroughly frightened, itwas not difficult to exact a promise that hewould consider a compromise.

Mrs. Soule, when she learned of Salome’sintrepidity,—set forth as it was by Mr. Greenough’sgratitude and gallant appreciation,—wasgreatly concerned for her niece and put herstraightway to bed, where, in fact, she had supposedher to be for the past hour, and whereshe wept over and caressed her as she had notdone since the girl had left home for boarding-school.And then, what was far more to thepurpose, she gave her a bath of alcohol andolive oil, and soothed her to sleep.

Early the next morning the agent of theShawsheen Mills sent a messenger over to thedingy room which served as headquarters forthe Labor Union, begging for an interview.

As this was the first overture of peace fromhis side, it was natural that it should be hailedwith glee by the officers of the Union. Andalthough, the day before, the leaders of thestrike had been closeted together in a seriousdebate as to how much they should yield toCapital, they now unanimously agreed not to“weaken” in the smallest degree.

57As for the agent, he had been persuaded toyield every point demanded by the strikers, insistingonly upon the one condition, that theLabor Union should be disbanded.

The question of ten hours he granted withouta murmur. He quibbled a long time overthe wage question, and the subject of weeklypayments, and only on seeing the dogged determinationof the laborers did he come to termson that. But he very properly, and tooperemptorily, refused to remove the spinningframes which had formed one subjectof contention. And then he proceeded tooverthrow the good effects of what concessionshe had made, by violently denouncing alllabor unions, and vigorously insisting that theone known as the Shawsheen Labor Union beimmediately and forever disbanded.

“Never,” said the foremost of the committee,“will we submit to so arbitrary a demand. Wehave a perfect right to organize our forces andassert our claims. How can we—a band ofday-laborers,—dependent on capital for a bareliving, win a single cause for ourselves withoutcombinations of this kind? There are scores ofquestions which involve not our welfare in one58way alone, but our health, our wages, ourmorals, our manhood, which we, as single individuals,can never cope with, but which, as aunited force, we can adjust. Besides, in alldepartments of labor, the women and childrenequal or exceed the men. There are to-dayone hundred and seventy-five thousand morewomen working in mills than there were tenyears ago; and what are they but the weakestand most dependent of employes? They haveno strength to agitate; they have no power tochange any existing order of things. All theycan do is to toil and submit. We owe it tothem as men, as husbands, brothers, and sons,to lighten their burdens. As free Americancitizens we owe it to ourselves, to settle theconditions of our own lives, so far as may be.This can only be done by combinations of thelaboring classes strong enough to compel manufacturersto concede us our rights.”

“You are right to a degree,” answered Villard,before Mr. Greenough could swallow hissurprise at hearing such sentiments from one ofhis operatives; “I believe there are some rightswhich you can only secure by a combination ofyour forces as working-men. But when you59let reason lose its sway, and passion take itsplace; when you are influenced by unworthydemagogues and unbalanced cranks, and seekto effect by strikes and such arbitrary measureswhat might be better secured by a more conciliatorycourse, you must not be surprised ifyou do not succeed in bull-dozing a rich concernlike this into obedience, and——”

“And when, by your —— labour unions, yousink so low as to countenance incendiarism andmurder—yes, sirs—that is what you attemptedlast night, sirs,—you can’t expect this mill isgoing to countenance them. I’ll see you allstarve and rot first,” and Otis Greenough’s facewas purple with anger.

“We have already disclaimed all knowledgein our Union, sir,” said one of the committee,“of last night’s outrage.”

“Blast it, what do I care for that?” roaredthe agent, as usual, out of temper. “Whetheryou knew it or not, it was done under cover ofyour strike, and your Union, and was one of theprecious outgrowths of it. Give up the ——thing, I say—or there is no compromise withthese mills.”

“There is little use in prolonging this interview,60I am afraid,” said the first of the committee,taking up his hat.

“Impudent dogs!” said Mr. Greenough, asVillard tried to speak, anxious to put things ona more satisfactory basis before the meetingclosed. “Let them go. They’ll find hardhoeing before they reach the end of their row.”

“And, sir,” retorted a fiery-looking man whohad not spoken before, “if it comes to openwar you’ll find us tough customers. We shallfight it out like men, even if we starve likebeasts.”

And with these words the committee departed,leaving matters worse than ever before in theaffairs of the Shawsheen Mills.

In vain did the two superintendents pleadand argue and threaten the choleric old agent.His blood was up and he was a veritable chargeron the eve of battle. There was no state boardof arbitration then, and therefore no availableway of settling their difficulties except amongthemselves. And as discussion only madematters worse, the subject which was alwaysuppermost in these three men’s minds wastacitly dropped. Every precaution was takento insure the mills from the danger it had61escaped the night before, and a detective wasobtained from Boston to hunt out the criminalswho had perpetrated the dastardly act.

“As the owner of the Shawsheen Mill property,I hereby appoint a meeting of all itsofficers at my house, to-night. Please havethem here at eight o’clock.

“Pardon me for the liberty I have seemed totake, and believe me ever a loving and respectfulfriend,

“Well, you hear that, boys,” said Mr. Greenough,after reading it aloud. “Be on hand.Tell the treasurer and cashier and head book-keeper.We’ll all be there. The Lord onlyknows what she is up to; but if that youngwoman hasn’t got a level head on her shoulders,then I don’t know who has.”

“I reckon you’re right, sir,” echoed Mr.Burnham, while John Villard laughed in hissleeve at the young woman who evidently62dreamed of settling a prolonged strike.“Why,” he said to himself, “she has neverknown enough of the practical side of mill-lifeto recognize one of her operatives, and hardlyknows the different brands of cloth manufacturedby them.”

Salome Shepard had waked at an early hourthat morning and found herself unable tosleep again. Her mind was alive withgratitude for the part she had been able toplay the night before, with apprehension forthe future, and with increasing self-accusationfor the state of things in the Shawsheen Mills,both past and present.

“Pshaw!” she said to herself while dressing,true to her habit of communing with her ownconscience in default of a visible mentor,“how can I be blamed for the state of thingshere? The entire business of the mills wasput out of my hands by my father’s will. Icould have done no differently.”

“You could,” replied that sternest ofmodern inquisitors—a New England conscience.“It was in your power to see that the moraland physical condition of these people was improved63and cultivated. It was in your powerto give them better homes and more privileges.It was in your power to raise their standards oflife and to create new ones. But you haveignored their very existence, and let them livea mean and sordid life of unremitting toil, inorder to furnish you with money to live aselfish life of luxurious ease.”

Salome tied the blue ribbons to her wrapper,and giving her crimps a last touch went downto breakfast.

Knowing she would be opposed, she saidnothing of her plans for the morning to heraunt, but simply announced, after they hadleft the table, that she was going for a longwalk.

Then she went upstairs and put on theplainest costume she owned (which, by the way,was a tailor-made gown that had cost her onehundred and fifty dollars), and started for thetenement houses where her operatives lived.

It did not occur to her to feel any fear; northat the miscreants who had planned the explosionfor the previous night might be watchingher footsteps. She felt it incumbent uponher to see for herself exactly how these people64lived, and what they were bearing and sufferingin consequence of the strike.

In the bright glare of the morning sun, thetenement houses had never looked so dingy andmean. They were built in Newbern Shepard’sday, and had received but very few repairssince that time. Although it was cold Januaryweather, Salome counted a dozen panes ofglass gone from the first house, and noticedthat the lower hinge to the front door wasbroken. It was a two-story wooden buildingwith four tenements of four rooms each.

She ascended the rickety steps and rappedon the door. One of the women saw her froma front window and came to the door, holdingit open only so far as to permit her to see thestrange caller.

“Good-morning, miss.” The politeness ofSalome’s manner thawed the other woman, andthe door opened a little wider. “Will youwalk in?”

That was precisely what she had come for,and Salome stepped inside with alacrity. Shefound herself in the sitting-room and living-room65of the family. It was a meager home.The remnant of a faded oil-cloth was on thefloor. The walls were unpapered and devoidof any attempts at ornament, except one unframed,dilapidated old lithograph of “TheQueen of the West,”—a buxom young womanwith disproportionately large black eyes, adress of bright scarlet cut extremelydécolleté,and cheeks of a yet more vivid hue. A pinetable covered with a stamped red cloth waslittered with cheap, trashy story-papers andpamphlets addressed “To the Laboring Menof America.” An old lounge, with brokensprings, and six common wooden chairs constitutedthe other furnishings of the room.

“I don’t wonder these people get discontentedand clamor for something which seemsto them better.”

But she found, before the forenoon was over,many houses that were not so pleasant as this.For, once inside these rooms, everything wasneat and clean, and the woman who answeredher questions was civil if not talkative.

She found that five people lived in these66four small rooms: this woman, her twodaughters, a son-in-law, and a grandchild.She also found that the other tenements containedfive, six, and seven people, makingtwenty-three in all. There were absolutely nosanitary arrangements, and she discovered thatthe sanitation of this tenement house districtconsisted only of surface drainage. According tothe statements of her hostess, there was nearlyalways somebody “ailing” in these houses.

The first house she went into was a fairsample of the remainder. A few were slightlybetter, but more were in a worse condition. Inmost instances she was respectfully received,although at three houses she was met by ungraciouspeople, and received gruff replies toher kindly-put inquiries.

Everywhere, strong, able-bodied men werelounging about in enforced idleness; and oneof them, resenting, with true American independence,this intrusion into the sacred precinctsof his miserable home, plainly intimatedthat “they was well enough off now, and didn’twant no rich folks as was livin’ on moneytheyearned, to come pryin’ round their houses.”Finally, at the last of the tenement houses she67was met by a surly, burly mule-spinner, whogruffly refused her admittance.

Nothing daunted, however, she sought out aboarding-house for the young women of themills. The landlady, recognizing her, invitedher in and willingly told her all about the lifeof mill-girls, offering, at last, to show her theirrooms.

Salome gladly accepted and followed thewoman up bare, unpainted stairs to the roomson the second and third floors. These weresmall and perfectly bare of comforts, almost ofnecessities. The floors were uncarpeted andguiltless of paint, or even of a very recent applicationof soap and water. They had no closets.A common pine bedstead—sometimes two ofthem—in each room, two chairs, in one ofwhich stood a tin basin, while beside it on thefloor stood a bucket of water, and a smallbureau, made up the sum total of the furniture.In only one room did Salome see any evidencesof a literary taste, and that, if she had knownit, was a cheap paper, the worst of the sensationalclass.

Salome’s heart sank within her. She nolonger wondered that the mill-girls of to-day68were a discontented, ignorant set, nor thatmany of them sank into lives of degradation.

“The rooms are good enough for the girls,”said the woman, noticing the look of disguston Salome’s tell-tale face. “They seem poorenough to elegant ladies like you. But thesegirls know no better. And they are goodenough to sleep off a drunk in,” she added,roughly.

“You don’t mean to say,” asked her guest,“that any of your girls get intoxicated?”

“Intoxicated? I don’t know what elseyou’d call it, when they have to be helped inat eleven o’clock Saturday night, and put tobed, and don’t get up again until Mondaymorning.”

Salome was sick with pity and shame forher sex. She no longer questioned whethershe had a mission toward these, her people.

She went home and wrote the note to Mr.Greenough, given in an earlier part of thischapter.

Promptly, at the hour named, Otis Greenough,accompanied by the other officers of themill, appeared at the mansion of the Shepardfamily.

Tall, beautiful, and always impressive in herbearing, Salome was at her best to-night.The fire of a new-born purpose was in herface, and a new force, born of spiritual struggles,stamped upon her brow.

There are people who can look calmly upona sunset, and see nothing but a glare of red andyellow light. There are others who see in ita glorious picture with matchless tints andshadows. There are yet others, fewer, indeed,than the rest, but who hold the secret of God’sholy purpose written more or less plainly intheir souls; who see not only the glare of redand yellow light, whose brilliant tints and deep70tones make an unrivaled picture, but who readsomething of the deeper meanings of the GreatArtist; who receive into their own hearts somepart of the glowing light which strengthenspurpose, and crystallizes hopes and idealshitherto dreamy and undefined.

Salome Shepard had stood at a westernwindow at sunset. In the hush and stillnessof the hour, the poet-quality of her soulhad interpreted to her the meaning of lifeand the great fact of human brotherhood.And when she finally drew the curtains on thedeepening night, she felt that a sudden revelationhad come to her—that, at last, her lifepurpose, in the shape of a sternly defined duty,stood revealed.

“Well,” said Mr. Greenough, after a fewmoments of aimless conversation, for nobodyseemed desirous of taking the initiative,“what are you going to do with us all to-night,little girl? Don’t you think you rather usurpthe privileges of an old man in calling togethera meeting to discuss business, of which he isthe legal head? Come, give an account ofyourself and your quixotic actions.”

“Oh, I beg that none of you will think71that.” And Salome looked around the roomappealingly. “I simply wished that we mighthave a fair and honest talk. I want every onehere to express his views. And I want to expressmine—for at last, thank heaven, I havesome.”

“Getting strong-minded, eh?” retorted Mr.Greenough. “Well, go on. I suppose youwant to practice on us before taking a largerfield. Going to take the suffrage platform?or build school-houses for the niggers? Or doyou aspire to the bureau of Indian Affairs?Which is it?”

“None of them,” responded Salome, inwardlyresenting the untimely jest, but determinednot to show her impatience. “None of them.I propose to begin nearer home. I propose togo to work, earnestly, and I hope practically,to raise the condition, morally, mentally andphysically, of my own factory-people.”

“And I have called you here,” pursuedSalome, “to ask each and every one of you tobe my assistant and coadjutor. I have notbeen thinking of nothing, during the last three72months. I am a woman, comparatively young,and with absolutely no knowledge of the practicalside of a working-man’s life. But I havebeen thinking, and my conclusions are these:that a strike is a much more serious matter forthe working-people than it is for us. We actas if they go out on a strike either to annoy usor to have a good time. I have been downamong them—sought the by-ways andhedges, as it were—and I tell you theyare having anything but a good time.This strike is the outcome of want and privation,and it has brought the people to stillgreater want and privation. I believe they arenot a set of noisy malcontents on the lookoutfor an opportunity to create a disturbance.On the contrary, they see in this course theonly chance of bringing before the public questionsof vital importance to them. They earntheir bread by the sweat of their brow—andnot always good bread either,—while we, ascapitalists, are hoarding up money. At themost, they get very little of what their workreally yields. I desire, above all things, sir,that you grant their desires and no longerrequire them to give up their Labor Union.73Capitalists have their Board of Trade, whichvirtually amounts to the same thing. Let theworkmen have their one chance to assert themselvesby a combination of their forces. Andlet each side show to the other that toleranceand Christian charity which each demandsfrom the other.”

“What about the tolerance and Christiancharity of the outrage they tried to perpetratelast night?” asked Mr. Greenough.

“I do not believe the Labor Union is responsiblefor that,” replied Salome, with a far-seeingsympathy in her eyes. “Unfortunatelyit was an outgrowth of their opinions, passionsand prejudices. But you must confess, sir,that had you met them with the tolerancewhich the growing spirit of the age demands,there is little likelihood that matters wouldever have reached the point where such anaction could have been planned. I want thisstrike ended on any terms. I want to see theoperatives, every one of them, at work again atfair wages. And then, God helping me, I proposeto do something for their elevation—somethingto help them live better, cleaner,manly and womanly lives—something which74shall carry out my grandfather’s noble plans,and help make the factory system of NewEngland one of her grandest achievements.”

“Miss Shepard is right,” said Mr. Burnham:“our factory, like many another, has been runtoo long on the system oflaissez-faire. I havecome to believe in a political economy whichinsists upon the liveliest activity on the part ofcapitalists, to put their employes upon the bestpossible footing as to the material surroundingsof life; that they have all the advantageas to health, morals and happiness which comesfrom sanitary regulation and practical education.I believe that only when we adopt sucha political economy as this shall we draw thelargest possible dividends from the products ofa community comparatively free from crime,intemperance, poverty and vice of every kind.”

“Yes,” urged Villard, “each one of us,laborer or capitalist, has duties to performwhich cannot be shirked or shifted to theshoulders of Fate—another name for the theoryoflaissez-faire. The new political economywill demand that every one who, in his or herpublic or private capacity, can do anything torelieve misery, to combat evil, to redress wrong,75to assert the right, shall do so with heart andsoul.”

“You see,” said Salome, delighted that twostrong, thinking men thus endorsed and voicedher sentiments, “we have been acting on theQuaker’s advice to his son: ‘Make money—honestlyif you can; but make money.’ Wehave forgotten that Christianity says: ‘Thoushalt love thy neighbor as thyself,’ ‘Do untoothers as ye would that men should do untoyou,’ ‘Bear one another’s burdens,’ and ‘Loveone another.’ But we have practically said:‘Love thyself; seek thine own advantage; promotethine own welfare; put money in thy purse;the welfare of others is not thy business.’”

“I must confess,” answered Otis Greenough,speaking slowly and huskily, “that I cannot,after a life-long devotion to old-fashioned ideas,take any stock in these new-fangled, impracticableones. I cannot, at my time of life, changemy ideas; and neither can I endorse your propositionto make a public spectacle of ourselvesin the future. Mills are run to make money.So long as I hold the position imposed uponme by the late Floyd Shepard, so long shallI refuse to countenance extravagance and quixotism.76But I am an old man. No one caresany longer what I think. It is the youngpeople with no experience whose opinions countnowadays. I am an old man who has had hisday——”

“Don’t, I beg of you, sir, talk like that,”interrupted Salome. “We do value youropinion; we do intend to refer to your judgment;we——”

“It is some one throwing gravel against thepanes,” said the cashier as a second showercame rattling against the window. He partedthe curtains and looked out.

The old agent’s blood was up in a moment,and regardless of the presence of ladies heswore in good, set terms, that the rascalsshould be arrested and imprisoned for this.

Then, unconscious of danger, in spite of theattempts of Villard and the rest to hold himback, he marched, like an old hero, boldly outon to the veranda which faced a crowd ofexcited workmen.

77They had held a stormy meeting at theLabor Union, and the worst element amongthem had become desperate, and swore to“bring the old man to terms.” They had gonein a body to the mills, where they hoped tofind some of their employers in consultation.There they had found that the whole forceof their opponents had gone to the greatShepard Mansion. Nothing daunted, theyturned their steps thither, and at every streetcorner were joined by the element of hoodlumismwhich is always scattered about over thestreets of a large and poorly-governed town.

Hence the mob that confronted the officersof the Shawsheen Mills held all the elementsof danger and disturbance.

When Otis Greenough’s bald head appearedbefore them, the crowd set up a yell of mingledderision and defiance.

“Give us fair play and fair wages,” calledanother, while worse epithets were hurled athim, from the roughs in the rear.

“This is outrageous!” he exclaimed in hot78haste. “What right have you to come hereand defile an honest citizen’s premises withyour wretched, polluting presence?”

“Stop that, now!” shouted one of the leaders.“Fair play all round. If you won’t come tous, we’ll come to you, and compel you to maketerms, and decent ones, with us. We want——”

But the crowd of street idlers who had comein search of excitement, and not argument, grewrestless, and broke in noisily; and when OtisGreenough opened his mouth to speak again,he was struck squarely in the face by a handfulof gravel and mud.

For what was this unexpected white formwhich appeared in the doorway, and advancedto meet them?

Salome was dressed in a clinging, white, softserge, with falls of fine lace at the neck andwrists, and under the dim light of the piazza-lamp,she seemed like an angel of retribution,her eyes flaming reproach, and her hands raisedin deprecation.

“Aren’t you ashamed of yourselves?” sheburst forth, in ringing tones. “You, who callyourselves honest men, and loyal citizens! You79who come here with a claim for fair play, youwho come here to assert the right of everyAmerican to be treated with respect by everyother; to insult and maltreat an old man withwhite hair—a man whom, as a long associatein your work, you should honor? Do youcome to my house to call forth a man whowas even now listening to plans for the improvementof your homes and lives and prospects,simply that you may turn yourselves intoa pack of dogs to bark at him? Go home.Lay aside your prejudices and your low, unworthypassions, and think whether we beentirely in the wrong. Think whether you areshowing yourselves worthy of being trusted?Go home and weigh calmly your conductagainst that of these officers, and decide foryourselves whether you deserve to be met half-way.And I give you my word of honor asowner of the Shawsheen Mills, that when youdecide to behave like men and not like beasts,you shall be treated as men. You shall havegood places with good pay. You shall findthat we are willing to do as much as—yes,more, than you are willing to do for us, andthat we will meet you half-way in the open,80fair discussion of all points connected with thelabor question.”

“Three cheers for the lady!” shouted ahoodlum, who cared not which side he was on,provided he could make a noise.

But the cheers were stayed, and further demonstrationwas choked in utterance. ForOtis Greenough fell suddenly at the feet ofthe woman who stood there boldly championinghim and her sense of right.

The superintendent carried him quickly withinand put him on a sofa; a physician was hastilysummoned, and in a few words Villard dismissedthe mob, now hushed and awe-stricken.

But Otis Greenough in one moment hadpassed beyond the disturbances of howlingmalcontents, beyond the petty smallness of hisold-fashioned and cramped ideas, out into thatworld where there is no fear of anarchy andsocialism, no disgrace in being a philanthropist,no bounds to the heart of love for all mankind,and no limits to the horizon of a larger,diviner life.

Death is never fully realized until he is anactual presence; and Otis Greenough’s suddendemise before their eyes and almost under, ifnot by, their own hands, solemnized and terrifiedthe mob, and brought the strikers to a sense ofthe desperate pass to which they had come.

The members of the Labor Union laid theirgrievances aside for the time, and paid everymark of respect to the old agent now that hehad passed beyond the recognition of it. Asudden fit of apoplexy had blotted out hischoleric and intolerant behavior, and left onlythe remembrance that he had been their headfor many years.

But when he had been laid away in the newcemetery on Shepard Hill, the smoulderingembers of discord began again to break forthinto hot flames of prejudice and passion.

82Geoffrey Burnham and John Villard were consultingtogether in the mill office the day afterthe funeral, when the door opened and theowner of the mills walked in.

“I have come,” she said, in answer to theirill-concealed surprise, “to talk over the situationof the strike. I want the mills re-opened.”

“We shall be only too happy to complywith your wishes, Miss Shepard,” said Burnham,placing a chair in a comfortable light forher. “Upon what terms do you propose it?”

“I want to compromise,” she answered,“and give them a better chance than they haveever had. It may take us some time to decideon the exact terms. Would it be better, do youthink,”—she unconsciously turned to Villard—“totake them back on the old terms, re-instatethem precisely as they were, and then goon and make our changes?”

“That would hardly do,” he replied. “Experiencehas proved them very jealous of newmethods, and unwilling to consent to untriedtheories. If we yield everything they demandnow, we shall establish a bad precedent; eh,Burnham?”

“Decidedly, and we shall meet with opposition83if we undertake any changes. If there isto be a remodeling of the old system, it hadbetter come now.”

“There must be a remodeling, it seems tome,” urged Salome. “Dear Mr. Greenoughacted wisely, so far as he could, no doubt; butI feel that the time is come to make decidedchanges here. Perhaps I am not very clear inregard to them, even in my own mind. But Ihave some idea of what I want, and I shall beglad to have you both state your convictionsand objections, if you have them, relating toeverything I propose.”

“It will be no light matter,” said Burnham,“to select a plan and perfect it at once. Itmust be a work of time and much thought.Still, what is your idea?”

“I want to put the relations between us andthe employes,” Salome went on, “on a betterfooting—an ethical basis, if you like the term.We must combine the question ‘Will it pay?’with a higher one, ‘Is it right?’”

“I do not propose to promise the people anera of absolute prosperity and uninterrupted84progress, and let them take it as a blind destinywithout exertion or sacrifice or patriotism ontheir part. I want to teach them to be healthy,intelligent, and virtuous citizens, and to expectfrom us the treatment such citizens deserve.I believe that such a course is for the pecuniaryinterests of the mill, as well as for theirs. Ihave heard enough of the conflicting interestsof labor and capital; and on the other hand Ido not believe in the twaddle that proclaimsthem one. I believe they are reciprocal,and that we must take that idea as fundamental.”

“You propose a radical change, I fear.”Geoffrey Burnham’s tone held a new respectfor this woman whom he had believed wrappedup in the toils of worldly and shallow aims.

“Yes, I may as well own it; I do,” assentedSalome. “Among my grandfather’s manuscripts,I came across, the other day, thesesentences: ‘I would like to prove my luminousideal of what a superintendent may be amonghis people. I would like to live long enoughto show the world that the spirit of the Crucifiedmay rule in a cotton-mill as fully as inthe life of a saint.’ That sentence, gentlemen,85must speak for me. In those words lies thegerm of my plan of action.”

Silence followed her. Geoffrey Burnhamtold himself that a new era must be dawning,—theera foreshadowing the millennium, since shewho held the power could so bravely avow herintentions to make the Shawsheen Mills anexperiment in what he called Christian socialism.But John Villard, after a moment, roseand extended his hand to Salome.

“I pledge my hearty co-operation,” he said,“and thank God for the opportunity to provewhat a cotton-mill may become by the newChristian political economy.”

“Thank you,” said Salome. “And nowlet us see just what the strikers demand, andhow far we can grant their wishes.”

John Villard produced the paper which hadbeen presented on the first day of the strike,and placed it in Salome’s hands. It was thefirst time she had seen it. She read it throughvery carefully.

“It seems to me there was no need of theselong months of idleness,” she commented,when she had finished the paper. “Now, letus see. First, they demand recognition, as86the Shawsheen Labor Union. I think we mayyield that point, safely enough.”

“They will take advantage of us. Theywill dictate and become arbitrary. The LaborUnion grows by what it feeds on. It will becomean elephant on our hands.”

“Not if they have something better to takeits place,” said Salome. “I am fully persuadedthat they will meet us half-way, if we give thema union that is better than theirs. Let theirunion alone for the present.”

“I am with you there,” said Villard. “Itdevolves upon us to change its character intosomething that shall be, at least, as helpful astheywant to make this one.”

“Next, the ten-hour system,” pursued Salome,who was not yet ready to discuss theimproved union. “Certainly there can beno possible objection against granting thisclause?”

“‘The new frames must be taken out and87the mules replaced, with a written agreementthat no more of the obnoxious machinery shallbe added for five years.’ That seems ratherarbitrary. How is it, Mr. Villard?”

“It is arbitrary,” he responded. “Theframes must be retained. We must be allowedto adopt improved machines and methods, orwhere shall we be in this age of competition?But I think there will be little trouble withthe men, if I am allowed to approach them inthe right way. Anyhow, I will try.”

“Do so,” was the reply. “Make them seethat improved methods are for their interest asmuch as for ours. As to the wage-section—weretheir wages actually cut down?”

“That must not be allowed,” said Salome.“The mills were paying a handsome profitwhen this was done, weren’t they?”

“Give them their old pay, with the understandingthat wages will be increased whenwork is heavier. I propose to myself a wildscheme of profit-sharing, or a sliding scale ofwages, in the future.”

88“Good,” cried Villard. “The very thingI’ve been wanting to try. I believe in itheartily. But where did you get the idea ofit?”

“Oh, I’ve been reading all the practicalarticles I could find on political economy, asapplied to mills and factories, for some months,”Salome replied, “and I have evolved some queertheories, I fear; but I propose to give them afair trial, unless you pronounce them too visionary.I am glad you approve of profit-sharing.And you, Mr. Burnham?”

“I approve of making the experiment,” saidthe more cautious superintendent. “I do notjump at conclusions. Nevertheless, the idea,though new, looks practicable, and I shouldlike to see it tried.”

“They have already tried it in one or twoplaces where it is proving a great success, Ibelieve,” said Salome. “You know the experimentwas tried as long ago as 1831, whenMr. John S. Vandeleur put it into effect successfullyin County Clare, Ireland. The Parisand Orleans Railway Company began to shareprofit with its employes in 1844, and the MaisonLeclaire, I think, two years before, both of89which have proved very successful. I do notsee why we cannot adopt it.”

“We can,” asserted Villard, confidently.“It is already being tried on a small scale byseveral firms in this country. Why should notwe join the procession?”

“It will entail extra expense for clerks andbook-keepers,” responded Burnham. “Thatseems unnecessary.”

“The men claim that they have to dependin great measure on the credit system at thestores,” explained Villard. “Their wagescoming only once a month, they get short ofmoney. If sickness or other additional expensecomes upon them, they are often seriouslyinconvenienced by lack of their rightful wages.Again, if they are able to put a little money inthe savings-bank, why should they not have thebenefit of the interest that accrues through themonth, rather than we? The money is theirs.”

“On the other hand,” interrupted Burnham,“those men whose first duty, on being paid off,90seems to lie in getting gloriously drunk, wouldhave the opportunity just four times asoften.”

“We have a work to do in that direction,”said Salome in a pained voice. “In a sense weare our brother’s keepers. I half believe thatthe solution of the temperance question islargely in the control of the employers of labor;and that the secondary, and often the primary,causes of intemperance are bad and unwholesomefood, which create a craving for drink;bad company, which tempts it; squalid houses,which drive men forth for cheerfulness; andthe want of more comfortable places of resortwhich leaves them no refuge but the saloons.It is in our power to remedy all these evils.Give them good sanitation, well-ventilatedhouses, comfortable homes, and reading-rooms,and coffee-parlors, and only the most depravedwill be tempted by the low saloons.”

“But, Miss Shepard, surely you do not proposeall these things?” and Geoffrey Burnhamlooked his astonishment.

91Salome smiled. Her money was her own.Why should she not use it as she pleased?

“No. For the first year or two I shall notpocket an immense profit; that is true,” sheassented. “But I am not likely to come towant. And Newbern Shepard’s mills mustbe put on the basis where he desired, above allthings, to see them during his lifetime. Heplanned a noble scheme. It is my birthrightand my duty to carry it into effect. It willcost me something to get the mills where theymust be; but it will pay in the end. Of thatI feel sure.”

“You are quite right,” said John Villard.“What may we not hope for when the conditionof the working-people shall receive thatconcentrated attention which has hitherto beendevoted to the more favored ranks? Whencharity, which has, for ages past, done so muchmischief, shall learn to do good? When thecountless pulpits of our country, which havealways been so active in preaching Catholicismor Anglicism, Calvinism or Armenianism, andall other isms, shall preach pure and simpleChristianity? When, by a healthy environmentof the toiling masses, and the exercise of92hygienic sense and science, mankind shall behealthy and free from questionable instincts andmorbidly exaggerated appetites? I tell you,we cannot even approach an estimate of theextent to which every improvement, social,moral or material, reacts on the nation’s ethicaland intellectual progress, and the prosperity ofher industries.”

“But you are taking us entirely away fromthe question in hand,” said Geoffrey Burnham,“which was, shall we grant the demand forweekly wages?”

“Not so far away as you seem to think,”retorted Villard. “The questions of sanitationand morality affect them, and us too, aswell as the question of weekly wages. Asfor the latter, I am in favor of trying iton.”

“So am I,” said Salome. “I am in favorof trying every new method until we can knowpositively which are the best ones.”

“With modifications,” said Burnham, smilingat her vehemence. “I don’t exactly approveof the weekly system, but the majorityare against me, and I may as well cast my votewith yours. Shall we send for their committee,93then, and offer them all concessions, exceptthose relating to the spinning frames?”

“Yes, I should do so,” said Salome, “andprepare to open the mills at once, providedthey decide to accept our terms.”

“That is practically decided already,”laughed Burnham, “by our accepting theirs.Villard, you may negotiate with them aboutthe frames. They are inclined to listen to youbetter than to me, for some reason.”

“They know I’ve been in their place,” saidVillard. “That makes all the difference inthe world to them. They think I understandtheir side of the question; that is all.”

“Then you will confer with them immediately?”said Salome, rising to go. “And willyou make all necessary preparations to open themills? And then will you confer with me?”

“Most certainly, Miss Shepard.” GeoffreyBurnham spoke for both of them. “But—Ibeg your pardon, you have not spoken of anew agent. We must have one, you know.I trust you have made some wise selection?”

“I am prepared to surprise you,” Salomereplied, buttoning her glove. “You two menwill oblige me by transacting all necessary business94for the present, in your positions of firstand second superintendents, and by lookingclosely after the thousand details which I donot yet understand. Meanwhile, I shall cometo the office every day and, with your co-operationand kind help, shall learn the business.I have too many schemes for the generalimprovement of the Shawsheen Mills and itsoperatives, to trust the mills in the hands ofa stranger. I propose to be my own agent.Good-morning.”

Salome Shepard never looked handsomer, orsmiled more sweetly, than she did when sheuttered the last sentence, and closed the doorbehind her, leaving her two completely astonishedhearers standing in the middle of theoffice.

“Whe-e-w!” ejaculated Geoffrey Burnham,after a little. “How does that strike you?The Shawsheen Mills run by a ‘female woman,’as A. Ward would put it! And, by George!we are expected to stay and work,—under awoman!”

John Villard broke into a peal of laughter.“It’s awfully funny at first,” he said, calmingdown again. “But, after all, why not?95She isn’t the empty-headed, aimless creaturewe thought her. She’s read and studied, andhas some very sound notions.”

“But, Villard—a woman-agent!” gaspedBurnham. “We shall be the laughing-stockof the whole state.”

“Let them laugh,” answered Villard. “Theylaugh best who laugh last. And with hernotions, her thirst for further knowledge, herenthusiasm, and, above all, her money, theShawsheen Mills will be in a position at theend of a few years to do the laughing, whilethose who laugh at us now will set to studyingour methods and come to us for advice.”

“But she knows nothing of the practicalpart of mill-economy,” objected Burnham. “Themills will go to rack and ruin. Jove! OldMr. Greenough would turn over in his graveif he could have heard her as she stoppedin the door and said: ‘I propose to be myown agent.’ A woman!”

“I know,” replied Villard, “that it willseem odd, and perhaps uncomfortably so, at first,to acknowledge her as head. But, after all,she does not propose to dictate as to thebusiness itself.”

96“She will,” interrupted Burnham. “Womenalways do. She will jump at conclusions,mistake her inferences for logical deductions andthe wisdom which comes only with experience,and, after the first month, will know more thanwe do. I know women. They are impulsiveand illogical; and they can’t subvert nature andbecome good business men.”

“No; but they may prove good businesswomen,” was Villard’s answer. “We do notknow, yet, what she can or what she will do.I believe she will be willing to leave the detailsof the business to us yet, for a long time. Sheis not a conceited woman; and although shehas the faculty common to her sex of makingsome surprising jumps at conclusions, I do notbelieve her to be obstinate about them. Sheproposes to make a study of the business, andrealizes that this is a work of years. And,besides, what will save the mills is this: shehas an extended plan in manuscript of hergrandfather’s scheme for making this an idealinstitution. If she is willing to leave thebusiness to us for the present, and is capableof adapting Newbern Shepard’s theories ofyears ago to the needs of to-day, we are all97right, Jeff; and a new era is about to beginfor the Shawsheen Mills.”

“I only hope we may like it,” assentedBurnham doubtfully. “And now for theconference with the Labor Union.”

Marion Shaw was one of those women whoselives are a constant giving of their best, withno thought of return. We have all seen suchwomen. From the self-sacrificing maiden auntin the humblest home, up to the FlorenceNightingales and Dorothea Dixes of the world,they are God’s angels, everywhere, to sufferinghumanity.

Marion Shaw and Salome Shepard had beenin boarding-school together; and although theformer had been left from the start to supportherself and her widowed mother, the friendshipbetween the two girls had never abated.

Marion’s mother had died a year before, andsomething material had dropped out of lifefor the girl. Grief and the solitude whichensued after her mother’s death told upon herconstitution; and when Salome’s letter of invitation99reached her, it was like a boon fromHeaven. She threw up her situation inMadame Blanc’s private school and went toShepardtown, arriving there late in the evening,before Salome’s visit to the counting-room.

When the latter came home they settled cosilyin Salome’s room for an “old-time talk,” suchas they had enjoyed as girls.

“Why didn’t you let me know you weretired to death with that interminable teaching?”asked Salome. “I should have had youcome to me long ago. You are as pale as aghost.”

“Oh, I’m all right now,” answered Marion,who never cared to talk of herself. “Tell meabout the strike here. I read of it in a Bostonnewspaper, when it came on, and again whenMr. Greenough died. But, after the fashionof newspapers with regard to anything youcare particularly to follow up, they droppedthe subject the minute one’s interest wasroused. And your letter was so meager! Yes,it was. You only write the barest details, andnot too many of them. Is the strike ended?”

“No, but I hope it will be before night,”Salome replied. “I’ve given orders this morning100that a compromise be made at once. Yes,don’t stare at me, please. Why shouldn’t Igive orders? They’re my mills.”

“I’m not staring. It’s vulgar to stare, andthe lady professors at Mme. Blanc’s fashionableboarding-school do not stare. Why, itwould be as much as their position is worth!”retorted Marion. “Yes, they’re your mills, Isuppose, and a handsome piece of propertythey are too, in the eyes of poor me, who ownonly the clothes on my back. But, pardonme, dear, it does seem a little odd to hearSalome Shepard, the most exclusive and themost fashionable girl at school, talk aboutgiving orders in a cotton-mill. You’re notgetting strong-minded, are you, dear?”

“If to begin to take an active interest intwo thousand souls, who are dependent upon mymoney and the business interests it represents,is to become strong-minded, I’m afraid I shallhave to plead guilty.” Salome looked narrowlyat her friend. Possibly she had mistakenher, and their sympathies were farther apartthan she had hoped.

“Bless you!” responded Marion heartily,“I’m strong-minded myself; want to vote and101all that. Don’t believe intemperance and lotsof other evils will ever be subdued in thiscountry, until women have something to say,and say it through the ballot-box. It is notso very dreadful when you once get on to thatplatform, is it?”

“Oh, I hadn’t thought of voting particularly,”Salome hastened to answer. “I don’treally think I want that. But I do want to dosomething for my people.”

“And you’ll find,” retorted Marion, “beforeyou’ve gone very far, that if you had the powerof legislation, you could help them ten timesas well.”

“Possibly,” Salome answered, doubtfully.“But, Marion, there are so many thingsabsolutely necessary to be done for the Shawsheenoperatives. If you could see them and thehomes they live in, the temptations to whichthey are exposed, the poverty in which theylive!”

“Yes, God helping me; them and thefactory system together. Behold me,” saidSalome, rising to her full height, and putting102on a mock-tragic air: “Behold and see: SalomeShepard, Reformer. That’s my platform.”

“Salome, dear, what do you mean?” Mrs.Soule had just come in. “Don’t mind her,Marion, she delights in hearing herself talklike a suffrage leader, lately. I don’t approveof it, as she knows; but I can only wait forthe mood to pass.”

“Which it never will, aunty dear,” Salomehastened to say. “So long as I live and amin a condition to work for the people who needsubstantial and material aid, as these people do,my life will be devoted to their service. I cannotgo on living the aimless, indifferent lifewhich has been mine ever since I left school.I must have some active interest, or I shallstagnate, or, worse still, settle into a cold, hard,selfish woman of the world. Unfortunately Iwas born with a heart; unfortunately for yourideal of the proper young lady of the period, Iwas born with a conscience, and this consciencetells me that my fortune was given me only intrust. It is not mine for selfish enjoymentalone; it is mine to make the world better andhappier and purer.”

“And you are going to work among those103miserable drunken operatives,” said her auntcoldly, “whose sordid lives, and ungratefulhearts, the whole of them, are not worth theeffort of even one month of your life, even ifyou were at all a capable woman of affairs, awoman of judgment and discretion, a womanof sound business sense,—which you are not.”

“Yes, ‘among the drunken miserable operatives,’”replied Salome, ignoring the latter partof her aunt’s speech. “Among those sordidlives and ungrateful hearts, that were worththe Christ’s dying, and for whom He worked,living.”

“You don’t think of joining the SalvationArmy, I hope?” exclaimed her aunt, quitebeside herself at this new development of herniece’s purposes.

“I shall hardly have the time, aunty. I’veaccepted a position at the Shawsheen Mills.”

“A position?” gasped Mrs. Soule. “Oh,Salome! Who offered you—whodared offeryou aposition?”

“The fair owner of the mills offered it,”answered Salome, enjoying the situation toits fullest extent. “And I accepted, aunty.104Marion, in me you see the agent of the ShawsheenMills!”

Marion Shaw rose and clasped her friendclosely to her bosom. She admired her splendidcourage and avowed principles, and honoredthis woman, with money and leisure at hercommand, who was willing and anxious to devoteher life to service for others. But not soMrs. Soule.

She applied a delicate mull and lace handkerchiefto her eyes, and wept to think to whatan end had come her years of training; hercareful watch, that Salome should never, by anychance, come in contact with a lower world;her life-long aim to make of Salome the perfectbeing prescribed by her somewhat limited andnarrowed rules of ladyhood.

She begged; she pleaded; she argued; shethreatened; she resorted to ridicule; butSalome stood firm, and now laughingly andthen earnestly defended the course she hadtaken.

“It’s of no use, aunty, as you see, for us toargue the case. I do not forget all your kindnessand love for me; but I must choose formyself,” she said, finally. “I am old enough105to decide questions of right and wrong. Hereafterwe will not argue any more. I must dothis; you must submit; and that is all thereis about it. Now, let’s make up and be friends,”and she bent down and kissed her aunt on bothcheeks, as she used to do when she was a littlegirl.

“You, a child of Cora de Bourdillon’s!”murmured her aunt, softening a little.

“Cora de Bourdillon was my mother,” saidSalome. “But before and above all else, NewbernShepard was my grandfather. I am likehim. I must be like him. And you mustsubmit to the laws of heredity.”

So there was never any more prolonged discussionbetween them. Salome’s nature beingso much the stronger, kind-hearted, weak Mrs.Soule could not oppose her further. But manytimes, in after years, was she heard to deplorethe fact that Cora de Bourdillon’s child wasso thorough-going an epitome of NewbernShepard.

“A good man,” she would say. “A perfectlyhonest and well-meaning man; but notlike Us!”

Early that evening Geoffrey Burnham andJohn Villard were announced. Mrs. Soule andSalome were alone in the parlors when theycame in, but Marion was sent for.

“And you’ve brought good news?” askedSalome. “They’ve consented to go to workagain?”

“Of course,” Burnham replied. “Theywere only too glad to meet us on any sort ofterms.”

“Wait till my friend comes down,” saidSalome. “She is interested, and will want tohear the details. Oh, here she is. Miss Shaw,allow me to present my two confrères (andteachers as well), Mr. Burnham and Mr. Villard.”

“And so it is really settled?” Salome asked,“and the mills are to be opened again?”

107“Monday morning, if you like,” replied Burnham,“or earlier. But to-day is Wednesday,and there are many things to be done wherethe mills have stood idle for months.”

“There is hearty rejoicing throughout thecorporation,” said Villard. “I was comingthrough there to-night and met a couple of littleboys with bundles of groceries in their arms.The smallest looked up and smiled. ‘We’regoing to have a good supper of meat and potatoto-night,’ he said. ‘The mills are going toopen and pa’s got work.’ I asked him howlong since he had had meat, and he said notsince Christmas; and even then he only hada turkey’s wing that somebody gave him.”

“It passed off smoothly,” Villard went on.“Burnham told him we came from you, andwere prepared to make terms with them. Weonly saw the committee you know, and theyare to lay our terms before the Union to-night;but there is no doubt that they will accept.They are really very sensible and shrewd,those fellows on the committee, eh, Burnham?”

108“Remarkably,” replied the first superintendent.“I didn’t know we had such intelligentmen.”

“But it is our business to know it,” Villardreturned, and Salome nodded her head. “Welaid our plans before them, and told themthat we would concede all their wishes, exceptabout the machinery of course. And one oftheir own number spoke up promptly and saidit was hot-headed bigotry on their part thathad made them stick for the removal of theframes. And that most of them, even theLancaster spinners, had come to see that everyimprovement to the mills meant an improvementof their condition. Then the secretarywanted to know if they were to be allowed toexist as a Union. Burnham told them that youwere taking a great interest in the managementof the mills; and that we all believe that noharm can come of their organizing themselvesinto an association, provided they werewilling to be reasonable, and to confer with usbefore taking extreme measures again. Hebegged them to believe that you are theirfriend, and want them all to have a fair chance.And he ended by assuring them that we, as109superintendents, fully concurred with you; andthat he hoped they would be willing to start ona new basis, and to consider our interests asthey expect and desire us to remember theirs.Burnham did himself proud, Miss Shepard, andI could see they were a good deal affected byhis conduct.”

“Blushing must be a novel sensation toyou,” retorted Villard. “The leaders shookhands with us when we came away andthanked us for what we had said, assuringus that they would be ready to enter themills again at once. And a different spiritis evident to-night, all through the corporation.”

“Don’t be too sanguine,” interrupted Burnham.“We’re not through the woods yet.And there are several ends to be achievedbefore the millennium dawns.”

“I should like,” said Salome, “if it willnot bore you too much, to outline the generalplan I have formed for raising the condition ofthings at the mills.”

“Nothing would give us greater pleasure110than such a proof of your confidence,” repliedBurnham.

“And we can assure you beforehand,” saidVillard, “of our hearty co-operation.”

No one but Salome noticed that her aunthad quietly slipped away when she spoke ofher plan. Mrs. Soule did not care to hearSalome “talk shop.”

“In the first place,” Salome began, “arethe mills all they should be? Are they welllighted, aired and drained? Is the machinerysuch as to benefit both the operators and thebusiness interests of the mills?”

“I don’t know,” pursued Burnham, “butthey are quite as good as the average. Thereare many worse mills than the Shawsheen.”

“That isn’t the point,” Salome replied.“Are there any better? Or are they capableof improvement?”

“They are very well-lighted indeed,” said111Villard; “your grandfather built much inadvance of his time, and the mills are all lightand strong. But they need better ventilationin cold weather; and, as you know, sanitaryscience in Newbern Shepard’s day was hardlyup to modern demands.”

“I propose putting in the best drainagesystem we can find. I propose bath-rooms,wash-rooms and elevators.”

“As for machinery, you will know what isneeded there. We want the latest improvedmethods of doing our work. It will not dofor us to be behind the times, or the worldwill laugh at our philanthropic efforts. Thestandard of the mills must be as high now asit was in my grandfather’s day. Nothing butthe best of goods, made after the most approvedmodern methods, must go out from us.Otherwise the world will say we are visionaryand lack good business sense.”

“At the same time, I want the mills made sopleasant and comfortable that our operativeswill prefer them to any other, knowing that112we propose to consult their interests and happinessin little things, as we desire that theyshall consult ours in great. Then their homes.Those old rickety tenement houses must beabolished from the face of the earth.”

“But you can’t do that all at once,” saidBurnham. “That is something that will taketime.”

“It is April now,” said Salome. “I proposeto begin at once on new houses for theoperatives. They will have to stay where theyare for the summer, but by cold weather Imean that every one of them shall be in newquarters.”

“Whew!” said Burnham; “youare awoman of business, Miss Shepard. But youwill have your hands full this year to buildnew houses for two thousand people.”

“It can be done though,” Villard replied.“There are plenty of carpenters and buildersto be had. What kind of tenements do youpropose?”

113“I have not fully decided. At first Ithought of having single cottages for everyfamily, with a tiny plot of land for each. Butsometimes I wonder if some of the plans formodel tenement houses would not be morefeasible. What do you think?”

“There are advantages in both,” said Burnham.“It is doubtful if many of the operativeswould appreciate a whole house, or takegood care of one. On the other hand, the besttenement house system in the world has itsdrawbacks.”

“In a country-place where there is roomenough, as there is here,” advised Villard, “itseems to me that the single cottage system isthe better. Each family can then have acertain privacy, impossible to the tenementhouse system. They can soon be educated upto caring for their places, and, I think, willsoon come to take pride in them. They maynot pay, at first; but they will serve a higherpurpose. I have thought it would be a finething,—in the Utopia of which I have oftendreamed,—if, connected with such a factory asthis, could be built some substantial, inexpensivecottages which could be sold to the working-men114with families, on very easy terms.Let them occupy them as tenants, for instance,until their rentals amount to a certain sum—saytwo hundred dollars,—unless they havebeen fortunate enough to have saved thatamount, which they can pay down, and thenlet them take a deed of the place and give usa mortgage. Pardon me, Miss Shepard, I amonly supposing a case.”

“And quite a supposable one,” said Salome,her eyes glowing. “Why can’t it be done?”

“Doubtful if any of them would burdenthemselves with a debt like that,” demurredBurnham.

“I think they would,” Villard responded.“The desire for a home of one’s own is an instinctwhich is implanted in every human breast.If the steadier, more sensible men of the millscould be induced to try it, it would soon becomethe ambition of all the younger ones toown their homes. I am sure the overseers, atleast, would like to try it. So many of ouroperatives live in a hand-to-mouth fashion,never saving anything. Let them see thatwhat they pay for rent will be creditedto them; that they are actually saving that115money, and they will, for the most part, gladlyfall in with the scheme. And when a manbegins to save up money, and to feel that he isworth something, his self-respect increases andambition makes a man of him. I tell you, Ibelieve the thing could be done here, and thecondition of our working-men be vastly improvedby it.”

“We will, at least, make the experiment,”said Salome earnestly. “At first a wild dreamcame to me of building model tenement housesand practically giving them the rent. But Isoon came to see that it would be better forthem to pay what they could afford for improvedconditions.”

“That would be far wiser,” said Villard.“To make them objects of charity would be tolower their condition in the long run.”

“Then I have a plan for the girls,” Salomewent on. “So many of them live in thosedreadful boardinghouses. I’ve been into one,and I wonder how any girl can keep her self-respectand live there. I am going to build alarge building, which shall have plenty of light,airy bedrooms, prettily and inexpensively furnished;so that a girl may feel that she has a116cosy little spot somewhere on earth of her veryown. I am going to have model bath-roomsand a large, cheerful dining-room. There willbe a matron to the establishment who will belike a mother to the girls; not one who willcare nothing whether her girls are sober andrespectable, or miserable and besotted, solong as they pay. This woman will win theconfidence of the girls, and lead them intohabits of personal cleanliness and commonsense; she will take an interest in their littlepersonal affairs, and advise them kindly andjudiciously. In short, she will make a homefor them in the truest sense of the word.”

“You will have to have her made to order,Salome,” interrupted Marion from the sofa whereshe had been an interested listener. “Suchparagons do not exist.”

“And would scarcely be appreciated by theaverage factory girl if they did,” added Burnham,smiling at Marion.

“I shall have a large and pleasant parlorwith a piano and a comfortable reading-room,”Salome continued, as though not hearing; “Idon’t suppose the girls, judging from what Ihear and see of them, will care much for reading117at first; but if I put plenty of light, healthfulliterature in their way, with illustrated booksand good pictures on the walls, they willgradually come to like them. And then, theremust be weekly entertainments, and perhaps ahall.”

“And what about the young men?” inquiredVillard. “Are you going to leave our sex outin the cold?”

“Yes, if you educate the girls so much abovethem, what are the young fellows to do?”

“They shall have such a boarding-housetoo,” said Salome, “only we’ll call themUnions. I hate the name boarding-house,and I should think they would; and then, byand by, there are still other schemes in my mind.There are children, plenty of them, on thecorporation. They are poor, sickly, unkempt,uncared-for. All this must be changed.”

“That will come, I think,” said Burnham,“with their improved conditions and surroundings.It is unhealthful where they now are.Shall you build the new houses there?”

“Oh, no, I forgot to say,” answered Salome,“that we must put up their new quarters onthe hill, the other side of the mills. It is much118pleasanter up there, and a far more healthfullocality. Work on them can begin right away.Will you find me the proper man to undertakethe building of the houses, Mr. Villard?”

John Villard’s heart fairly burned with enthusiasm.This was a project he had longcherished, although he had been entirelywithout means or prospect of ever being ableto carry it out.

“And we will reserve the power of directingand planning the buildings ourselves,” she added.

“I’m glad you’re going to do something forthe children,” said Marion. “If you don’tsucceed in improving things in this generationmuch, you will in the next, if you educate thechildren.”

“That is what I propose to do,” said Salome.“They must have better schools than they everhad.”

“Oh, there are so many things to be done. Itwill take years to get everything in workingorder.”

119“You have laid out a beautiful scheme, MissShepard,” remarked Geoffrey Burnham, “andin most respects a practical one. But youmust not be too sanguine. These people areignorant,—fairly steeped in ignorance. Theyare jealous, too, and doubtless will mistrustyour motives, and believe you have some selfishreason behind all your endeavor.”

“I have,” laughed Salome. “I want mymills to be models, and my people to be thebest, most skilled, most intelligent, and mostprogressive community in America.”

“I am not so sanguine as you may think,”Salome went on. “I know they are ignorant.How should they be anything else? All theirlives they’ve been used as we use the machinesin the factory,—to make good cloth, and plentyof money. Nobody has thought of their welfare,or cared what they did, or thought, orbecame, when working-hours were over. Howdo we know what sort of men they are, or whatcapabilities they possess? I read somewhere,only the other day, that there may still beFichtes tending geese, and Robert Burns’ toilingon the farm; that there may be, yet, successors120of William Dean Howells at the type-forms, ofT. B. Aldrich at the book-keeper’s desk, ofMark Twain at the pilot-wheel. We have noright to keep them back. But this writer wenton to say, that the world has less need of them,even, than of those who cannot aspire to thriveoutside the shop, and who go to their daily toilknowing that their highest hope must be notto get ‘out of a job’ and not to have theirwages cut. I don’t suppose they will, at once,appreciate our efforts to better their condition.Possibly they will oppose us at first; but wecan have no better task to perform than tomake them prosperous, contented and joyousin their work. And by making a man of theoperative, I fully believe we shall bring materialprosperity to the mills.”

“But the expense,” urged Burnham. “Haveyou calculated that? I doubt if the mills couldstand so heavy a burden all at once.”

“I have calculated the expense,” Salomeanswered him. “And what cannot be done fromthe yearly profits of the mills, I will do myself.”

“We shall be eagerly watched by the wholemanufacturing world,” said Burnham.

“So much the better,” added Villard. “It121is time somebody set the example. If wesucceed in carrying out all these plans, and keepthe mills on a paying basis as well, it will bethe beginning of a mighty reform in the working-man’sworld. I believe we can succeed.”

“You will be called quixotic and all sorts ofpleasant things, Salome,” said her friend Marion.

“The beginner in any reform is alwayscalled a crank, if nothing worse,” repliedSalome. “If I chose to build a million-dollarcastle to live in myself; if I preferred to dressin cloth of gold and silver; if I insisted uponeating off solid gold dishes; or even if I wereto endow a church or a female college, theworld would admire and praise me, and saythese things are a rich woman’s prerogative.If I choose instead to spend my fortune on theShawsheen Mills, and elevate by its judiciousexpenditure two thousand operatives for whomI ought to feel morally and socially responsible,the world will probably wonder and call mequixotic. Christ Himself was called a fanatic.Most people to-day, if they voiced their realsentiments, would wonder that He could be sodemocratic as to die for the whole world, ignorant,uncultivated, detestable sinners, and all.”

122One of those silences fell upon the room,that always follows the mention of Christ’sname in a conversation not strictly “religious”in character. Marion was admiring the courageof her friend; Burnham was rather takenaback at this fearless reference to a Beingwhom he seldom heard mentioned outside thechurches; and Villard was surprised and delightedwith this unworldly woman of the world,and her avowal of principles and hopes andwishes which he had cherished for years. Hewas the first to speak.

“You must have done some hard thinking,—anda good deal of reading, in the past sixmonths.”

“Yes,” answered Salome. “I have. I haveread everything I could think or hear of, onsubjects bearing on this case; and I have lainawake many a night, since it was really borne inupon me that I have something to do here, planningmy work. But the greater part of thecredit, if there is any, in my plans, lies with mygrandfather. He thought out many of thesethings, years ago; I have simply adapted histheories to our modern times and conditions.”

Had Salome realized the burden of carewhich she was taking upon herself, it is doubtfulwhether she would have assumed it ascheerfully as she did. But as weeks rolledinto months, and responsibilities multipliedand cares increased until she became as hard aworker as any in the mills, she did not flinch.She had put her hand to the plough, and itdid not once occur to her to turn back.

She went to the office of the mills the daythey were opened, and began to study, thoroughly,the details of the business. Villard andBurnham were her teachers, and both wereoften astonished at her business keenness andcool judgment. She had pressed Marion intoservice immediately, and always took her tothe counting-room, where the two staid124throughout the entire morning, going home tolunch at two, and usually remaining there therest of the day. But always, whether she wasin the house, or out driving, or overseeing thenew houses, which were progressing rapidly,Salome’s one thought was the improvement ofconditions at the Shawsheen Mills.

“I should be so glad,” replied her friend,“but I can’t afford it. I shall have to go outinto the world again, before long, to earn myliving, dear; but I will stay here as long as Ican.”

“You good girl!” was Salome’s answer.“Why not stay here and earn your living?I want a companion, shall very soon need asecretary, and as soon as I get things in runningorder, ought to have a woman like youto help draw in my people. You need a congenialplace at a comfortable salary. Now,why not stay? I will pay you a thousanddollars a year.”

125“It isn’t worth that,” she said; “MadameBlanc only paid me seven hundred.”

“Madame Blanc is not fixing a scale ofwages for me,” said Salome; “as to your‘worth,’ my dear, I must judge of that. Whenwe get fairly at work, I shall give you enoughto do, and you will find yourself a very busywoman. Besides, if I had a young man to dowhat I want you to do for me, he would ask athousand dollars, wouldn’t he? And whyshouldn’t you have it? Because you are awoman?”

Marion was not demonstrative. On the contrary,she had a great deal of the true NewEngland reserve; but she got up and went overto her friend, put both arms around her neckand then——cried.

“If you could know what a chance this isfor me!” she said at last. “If you had knownwhat a dreary thing existence had become, andwhat a hopeless prospect I had in the future!And now, to live here and work with you,—inyour grand scheme,—Oh, Salome!” And shewept again.

“Then I will put the care of the cottagesinto your hands first of all,” said Salome, patting126her cheek. “You’ve kept house and knowwhat one ought to be like for an ordinaryfamily,—what things are necessary for thecomfort of the household and convenience ofthe housewife. I don’t. I should be as aptto build expensive music-rooms and leaveout the pantries, as any way. Go ahead, andget up as nice houses as you can, at $1,500,$2,000 and $2,500 a piece. Mr. Villardthinks none of the employes will care to buyanything more expensive. Here is the architect’saddress,” and she handed Marion a card.

But the building of the model boarding-housewas a project too dear to Salome’s heartfor her to easily relinquish to others. Herplan, as she had presented it to Villard andBurnham, grew and magnified itself until herco-laborers had to resort to all sorts of argumentsto keep her from wild extravagance.

She had begun by planning for the factory girlsa house which should be really a home;but as she went about among the operatives,and began to get an inkling of what the youngmen of the mills really were, of the bare, desolatedens which gave them shelter, she didnot wonder that they resorted to the streets for127comfort and amusement. She began to see howthe young men and girls who entered the millscould scarcely help drifting into low and unworthylives; and she grew more determinedto do something to raise them to a higherplane of living.

Her grandfather’s manuscripts did not helpher much here. In Newbern Shepard’s day,the factory-hand had not sunk to such ignoranceor even degradation, as he has, in someinstances, in later times; and in those moredemocratic times, it had not been so hard forhim to rise above the level of his kind. Inthat day, too, it had been possible for him tofind a home, in the true sense of the word,with families of a certain degree of refinement.But in Salome’s more modern times, she saw,and grieved, that the factory boarding-placeswere of the sort that dragged the operativesdown and kept them on a lower plane, even,than the Shawsheen tenement system.

She consulted much with the superintendentsand with Marion. She visited the largecities and thoroughly examined the youngmen’s and young women’s various houses andunions. She got ideas from all, but a perfected128plan from none. Finally, she collaboratedwith her architect, Robert Fales, and soon hadher model boarding-house on paper. Afterthat it was only a work of days to begin onthe foundations of the institution.

The operatives at the Shawsheen Mills gazedon all these changes with curious interest,which, however, they carefully suppressed whenany of their superiors were about. The averageindependent American citizen, as he existsamong working-men, does not care to pose asan object of even partial charity. He delightsin crying out against Capital, and clamoring fora share of the Profits; but when it comes toactual taking of what he does not feel he hasearned, he is more backward.

The Shawsheen operatives, in spite of thepromises which had been made, had gone towork again with little hope that the state ofaffairs for them would be any better in futurethan in the past. As days went by, and theysaw Salome Shepard come to the mills everymorning, and knew that she was personally interestedin them as her people, they were skepticalof any results for good. And when they beganto hear it whispered that she, a woman, was129the actual head of the Shawsheen Mills, someof them talked earnestly of leaving. What!they—strong, able-bodied, skilled mechanics—workunder a woman?

But they didn’t go. A dull season was uponthem, and work scarce. Other mills were shuttingdown and sending their operatives intotwo months of enforced idleness. The Shawsheenhands were forced to stay where theywere and be thankful for a chance to work.

Then, as the story that they were to befurnished with new and better homes gainedcredence among them, their first real interestdawned. Many did not believe their conditionswould be bettered; many, even, did notcare; and most of them grumbled becausetheir rents would probably be high, and saidthe new buildings were only a means to grindthe poor and extort more money from them, toput into a rich woman’s pocket. Such is thethankless task of the philanthropist.

“A few months will convince them,” shesaid, quietly. “No wonder they are on thelookout for oppression and extortion. As near130as I can judge, this factory has long been runon a plan to warrant them in such a belief.”And this was all she ever said against OtisGreenough’s method of administering affairsat the mills.

As the summer went by, Salome’s friends inthe town began to wonder at her extravagantoutlay, as they called it. They prophesied thatshe would soon tire of her new amusement, andleave the houses unfinished, when her projectswould fall flat. Some of them came to her andremonstrated, on the ground that her inexperiencein financial affairs was cause enough forher leaving the Shawsheen Mills and theemployes as they had been. But invariablyshe replied, that if she had chosen to buildherself a million-dollar castle, they would haveapproved of her; but because she proposedto spend a half-million on the mill property,all of which she felt sure would return to hersome day with interest, she was called extravagantand foolish.

“But if you had built the million-dollarhouse,” said Mrs. Greenough, “it would havebeen a great thing for the place. Think whatan ornament to Shepardtown it would be!”

131“And think what an improvement—what agreat thing for Shepardtown—it will be totear away those miserable, tumble-down tenementson Shawsheen alley, and to add a hundredneat and cosy houses to the hill,” sheretorted. “And, besides, you haven’t seen my—well,my Institution (I haven’t named ityet). Think what an ornament that will beto the place.”

But as nobody realized what the “Institution”of her dreams was to be, Salome got nosympathy from her friends. Curiosity increasedon all hands, as the summer waned and animmense brick structure grew apace on the hill.It had a square, dome-like center, with hugewings on each side. But the workmen weresworn to secrecy, and nobody was allowed to goinside from the time the building was farenough advanced to allow of its entrances beingfastened up.

It was finished at last. The plasterers andpainters and plumbers had done their laststroke of work and departed, leaving the keyswith Salome, as she had requested. On thesame afternoon, she sent for Robert Fales, andtogether they showed Burnham and Villard,with Marion Shaw and Mrs. Soule—who wasas anxious as any of them to see the place,although she would not own it—over the newbuilding.

A broad flight of stone steps led up to themain entrance. The wooden framework, whichhad concealed the façade, had been taken down,and there, over the massive doorway, was thename of Salome’s “Institution,” carved in redsandstone—“Newbern Shepard Hall.”

133“Or Salome Shepard Hall?” put in Mrs.Soule’s voice, for she felt that it would be likethe rest of her niece’s folly to have her namecarved in stone up there.

“Auntie!” exclaimed Salome reprovingly;then, turning to Geoffrey Burnham—“ShepardHall might have meant me, or it might havemeant my father, or the whole race of us ingeneral. This building is a memorial to NewbernShepard, not to his family. How do youlike the design of the façade?”

The building was of red brick, with massivetrimmings of red sandstone, and was substantialand useful in general appearance, ratherthan ornate.

“Yes,” answered Burnham, to whom the remarkwas directed. “A cheap, wooden buildingwould have answered the purpose, I should say.”

“Perhaps,” laughed Salome; “but I am notputting up wooden monuments to my grandfather’smemory. Besides, you don’t know mypurpose, yet.”

“Something quixotic and unnecessary, I’mafraid, my dear,” answered Mrs. Soule.

134Salome did not answer but led the way upthe stairway, and unlocked the heavy doorsThese opened into a vestibule leading into alarge room fitted up with bookcases andtables.

“This is the library,” said she. “Now, seethe two reading-rooms, one on each side. Oneis for the girls, and one for the young men.”

They passed out into the one designed forthe girls,—a pleasant airy room with plenty oflight and space. The walls were tinted andthe woodwork was in the natural finish. Nothingin the way of furnishing had, of course,been done. Beyond the reading-room was anotherlarge class-room, and opening from itwere several smaller ones. These all occupiedone wing of the new building.

“I’ve read and studied ‘All Sorts and Conditionsof Men’ to some purpose,” she said;“I propose, as time goes on, to have variouspractical and useful things taught the girlshere. Dressmaking for instance, and millinery135and domestic science. The conveniences forthat, though, are in the basement.”

She led the way by a flight of stairs that ledfrom a side-entrance, at the end of the wing, tothe basement. There was a spacious hall withrows of hooks to hang garments on. Fromthis, opened a large and pleasant dining-room.Under the main portion of the building was agreat kitchen with ranges and all the modernappliances of a hotel kitchen, though on asmaller scale.

“Isn’t this rather elaborate for a factoryboarding-house?” asked Burnham; “for, Itake it, that is one of your objects, at least, ifnot the primary one.”

“I approve of this,” said Mrs. Soule judicially.“It’s poor policy to fit out a kitchenwith cheap stuff. Give servants the best ofeverything to do with, and teach them how totake care of them.”

“Miss Shepard has gone over the subjectvery carefully,” said Mr. Fales, “and, I mustsay, has shown most excellent judgment ineverything. As you say, madam, it’s onlymoney wasted to put cheap stuff into a buildinglike this.”

136“Now, look through the pantries and larderand laundry,” Salome interrupted; “I think,for a woman who knows absolutely nothing ofthe details of housekeeping, I’ve excelled myself.”She spoke boastfully and shook her headat Marion, at the close of her speech.

“Every bit of it, below the main floor,”responded Salome. “Since you seem incapableof believing that I did it, I may as wellown that Marion and Mr. Fales planned thewhole of the basement, and that I, in my ignorance,could only look on and admire. Butthey did so well that now I am inclined to takeall the glory to myself.”

They passed through the basement, comingup at the other end of the building, and foundthemselves in the young men’s wing. Here,besides the reading-rooms and class-room,was another fitted with two or three workbenches.

“I propose to give them a chance to takean industrial education,” said Salome, “if theyshould want it.”

“I declare!” ejaculated Mrs. Soule. “To137give skilled mechanics a chance to take lessonsat the work-bench! You are out of your mind,child.”

“I didn’t plan it for skilled mechanics,auntie,” said Salome gently, “although theymay come if they want to. But you know,or ought to, that the majority of our men canonly perform one kind of work. They may benearly perfect in their special branch, but arealmost helpless when it comes to handling thehammer and saw and chisel. If they learn theproper use of these things, it will not only increasetheir knowledge in that direction, it willbroaden them in other ways.”

“Besides,” put in John Villard, “if it doesno other good, if the experiment keeps a fewof our fellows off the street at night anddevelops a new taste, it will be worth while.”

“Well, perhaps you are right,” said Mrs.Soule, “but no such philosophy or philanthropywas taught in my day.”

“‘The world do move,’ auntie,” laughedSalome. “Now, shall we go upstairs?”

A broad flight of steps from the hallway atthe end of the wing led up to the second floor,138which was just like the one on the girls’ wing.Upstairs, the broad corridor ran through themiddle of the wing, with bedrooms openingfrom either side. In the main body of thebuilding, under the dome, was a large hall,fitted up with movable seats, and having araised platform at the front.

“This is the pride of my heart,” Salomeannounced, as she ushered her friends into it.“If any one dares to criticise it, woe be untohim! Mr. Burnham, what fault can you findwith this?”

“I should not dare make it known, if I hadany,” he said. “But may I ask what it isfor?”

“Why, to hold meetings in, and lectures andthings,” she answered, quickly; “what did yousuppose?”

“Oh! And for the Labor Unions to congregatein and plan how they may overthrowand destroy you, I suppose,” scoffed Burnham.“And it is a capital place to breed thenext strike.”

“There will be no ‘next strike,’” was theconfident answer. “And as for the rest, wait139and see. I had the seats all movable becauseonce in a while there will be a party, and theywill want the floor for dancing.”

“Why not? The floor is an excellentone for dancing. I saw to that myself,”said she, purposely misunderstanding her relative.

“You are not going to let them have theirlow dances here?” Mrs. Soule’s tone showedhow much the idea horrified her.

“Low dances? Certainly not,” said herniece. “But we are going to show them howto have something better. We are going tolift them above wanting a low entertainment ofany kind, and teach them how such thingsare carried on by better people,—by us, forexample.”

“Salome, you don’t mean me to understandthat you are going to come and dance here,yourself?”

“Perhaps, though I had not thought of it.But why not?” continued the perverse niece.“Mr. Villard, will you lead the first figure withme, on our opening night?”

“With the greatest pleasure in the world,”140said he, with a thrill at his heart which he didnot recognize.

“I never knew my father well enough tojudge.” Salome answered, with a slight tingeof bitterness in her tone. “But I know whatmy grandfather would say. I am going to puta piano in here,—or would you have an organ?—andI intend that this hall shall be the rallyingplace of the young people. I’m also goingto give a course of entertainments here duringthe winter, twice a week; I’m not going to beginwith lectures and heavy ‘intellectual treats;’but I will gradually lead up to them with concertsand even a minstrel show or two.”

“You see, if we begin by shooting over theirheads, they won’t come at all,” said Salome.“But if we begin with something light andamusing, and not too far above their level, andgradually raise the tone of the entertainments,they’ll find themselves attending lectures and141other sugar-coated forms of intellectual betterment,and like them; and never mistrust that Iam working out a mission on their unsuspectingheads.”

“I’m glad you realize something of theirpresent intellectual condition,” said John Villard,who had been unusually silent and gravewhile looking over the new building; “andrealize that it’s only gradually that we canbring them, as a class, up to a higher grade asintelligent young people.”

“Oh, I do,” said Salome, “I’ve seen too muchof them, myself, this summer. At first, I wasappalled by the absolute lack of common knowledgeamong the average girls. But there area few, I know, who have already improved theslight advantages they’ve had; and these fewI shall rely on to help me by their influence inraising the rest; the ‘little leaven,’ you know.It seems to me, that only by raising the intellectualcondition, and the educational aspiration,can we hope to accomplish anything ofpermanent value to the mills.”

“That is the only way,” was Villard’sresponse. “And, Miss Shepard,” he said,hurriedly, for the others had already scattered142through the girls’ wing, leaving them alone,“I want to say that, as I believe you havefound the only true solution to the main questionsof the labor problem, I pledge myself toheartily sustain you in every way. You haveonly to command me, and I am ready.”

Why did Salome turn away to hide the vividblush that suddenly swept over her face?

“I am sure of that,” she said, presently, withan effort, “I have counted on you from thefirst. I shall try, by my own personal efforts,to help the factory girls. But I shall dependon you, and you alone, to manage the youngmen.”

“I shall not fail you,” was all he said, asSalome locked the door of the hall behind them,and they went over the girl’s wing to find theothers.

The bedrooms on this wing were like thoseon the other side. There were ample closetsand plenty of light and air and window space.The rooms were not spacious, but they werecomplete in every respect, and a vast improvementon anything the Shawsheen mill-girls hadever seen.

“I did not want large rooms,” said Salome;143“I think it is better to put not more than twogirls in a room. I shall put two single beds ineach, and fit up the rooms with everythingnecessary for comfort; then I shall insist thatthe girls keep their own rooms in the best oforder. Oh, you’ll see what a disciplinarian Ishall be!”

The third floor was entirely given up to bedrooms,the two wings being entirely separatedfrom each other by the upper portion of thehall which extended to the top of the dome.Every part of the building was beautifullyfinished, well-lighted, and planned for general,practical convenience.

“There, if I never do anything else,” saidSalome, after they had come out of the place,and stood looking back at it, “I shall feelthat I have raised a suitable monument to oldNewbern Shepard. I believe, if he could havelived until now, that he would have done thesame thing himself—only better.”

“Yes,” admitted Burnham, “it is. But doyou realize, Miss Shepard, what an elephantyou’ve got on your hands? It’s going to be a144fearful tax on your mind and strength to keepit up, and to carry out half you’ve planned.”

“Well, what were health and strength givenme for?” Salome asked, with the abruptnesswhich sometimes characterized her.

“Most young women find a solution to thatquestion without running an eleemosynary institution,”was Burnham’s mental comment;but he said nothing.

“I expect to see my happiest days while Ihave the care of this establishment. I’m sureI never was so happy as I’ve been for the pastsix months. Now, I must finish this greathouse. I shall need all the suggestions andpractical aid you can each give me, especiallyabout the libraries and reading-rooms. As tothe selection of books, I’m going to begin witha comparative few. Will you two gentlemencome up to the house to-morrow night, preparedto help make out a suitable list?”

“You forget that I have to go to New Yorkto-morrow,” said Burnham. “But Villard cango; and I can help afterwards, you know.”

“As soon as we get everything in readiness,”pursued Salome, “we will have a formal opening.We’ll have music and something good145to eat, and a little talking, and perhaps a danceto close with.” Salome looked wickedly ather aunt, but the latter paid no heed. “Rememberyour promise, Mr. Villard.”

They separated very soon, Salome and heraunt and Marion taking the architect homewith them, and Burnham and Villard goingback to the mills.

But all through the afternoon, and allthrough the watches of the night, one sentencerepeated itself to John Villard’s heart, comfortingand helping him, strangely: “I havecounted on you from the first.”

It was Halloween when the new buildingwas formally opened. Up to that time, only afew privileged persons were allowed to enterits sacred portals; but every one connectedwith the Shawsheen Mills was invited to bepresent at the opening.

On the hill, back of the mills, stood onehundred new cottages, each costing fromfifteen to twenty-five hundred dollars, and allready for occupancy; but as yet none of themill-hands had seen the inside of one of them.

It had been a work of no small magnitudeto find a suitable matron for the NewbernShepard Hall. But, finally, the widow of aformer physician in Shepardtown, a woman ofexcellent character and judgment, and withsome experience as matron of a young ladies’school, was secured and duly installed in the147two pleasant rooms set apart for her in thegirls’ wing.

John Villard had relieved Salome’s mind ofanother perplexity, by offering to take up permanentquarters for himself in the youngmen’s side; for, although she had felt thenecessity of such an arrangement, she had notliked to ask him to give up what she rightlyguessed were more congenial apartments in aquiet corner of the town. But he felt that hisinfluence would be needed at the Hall, andthat he could do the work which he hoped todo much better, if he were in the midst of theyoung men whom he wished to interest inmany ways. And before Halloween, he wascomfortably settled in two rooms at the Hall.

The evening came, clear and cold; such anevening as only the last of October can give.The building was brilliantly lighted from topto bottom, and decorated with flags and evergreen.Outside, Chinese lanterns and buntinglined both sides of the walk up to the mainentrance, and helped to give it a holiday air. Aband of street-musicians, who happened to bein town, had been engaged and were stationedin front of the building, where their tolerably148harmonious strains gave just as much pleasureto the not over-critical audience that was fastassembling, as Thomas’ or Seidl’s men couldhave afforded them.

Inside, Salome waited impatiently. Withoutany premeditated plan, Villard and Burnhamplaced her and Marion, with Mrs. Soulein the background—for she “declined to beintroduced to these persons”—in the center ofthe library; and forming themselves into areception committee, they drafted into servicea few of the best-appearing young men, whopresented every comer to the owner of themills and her friend. After giving each one acordial welcome and hand-shake, Salome toldthem they were free to inspect the new buildingas they pleased; and, consequently, everymill-hand, accompanied by every other memberof his or her family, went critically over thewonderful new building, which seemed to theirunaccustomed eyes a structure of unwontedmagnificence, and furnished in a most luxuriousstyle.

It had been fitted up inexpensively, but withthe utmost good taste. No carpets were onthe floors, but American rugs abounded wherever149they had seemed necessary. The libraryfurniture was of plain, substantial oak, like theheavy woodwork of the room. Throughoutthe rest of the house, bedrooms, dining-rooms,and class-rooms were furnished with strong,neat, ash furniture. There were a few goodengravings on the walls of the principal rooms,and the bookcases were about half-filled withliterature of a harmless and interesting, if lightquality. They had all agreed it would not bebest to fill the shelves at first, but to watch thepopular taste and to “leave room for improvement,”as Marion said.

The operatives were simply astonished atwhat they saw. Some were even yet incredulous,and whispered that they would not be willingnor able to live in such a place; but manyof the girls’ eyes brightened as they inspectedtheir new quarters, and showed a determination,on the part of their owners, to come in for someof the good times they saw in store. It is doubtfulif even the lowest ones there did not feel anew self-respect creeping up in their hearts.Dress may not make the man, but surroundingsoften do the woman.

By half-past eight the stream of people150stopped pouring through the big front doors.Everybody had come in, shaken hands withSalome and Marion, and passed along, scatteringthemselves over the building.

“Now let’s get every one into the hall,above,” said Salome, “and have a little talkingand some music.”

It was some little time before the crowd ofvisitors could be gathered in one place, butafter a while the hall was well filled, and themusicians installed in their place. The soundof the band, indoors, proved an effectual summonsfor the stragglers. For the first time,Salome, on the platform, faced a surging, eagercrowd of her own people in Newbern ShepardHall.

She had wanted one of her two “faithfulhenchmen” to take the lead to-night; butthey had each refused, saying she was betterfitted than they; that it was eminently her ownaffair and not theirs, and that the success ofthe opening depended on her alone. Thelast argument was enough, and, much toMrs. Soule’s horror at seeing “Cora de Bourdillon’sdaughter” in such a plight, Salomepresided over her first meeting,—“exactly151as if she were one of those ‘woman’s rightswomen.’”

When the musicians had finished, Salomestepped forward, and not without some inwardquaking, made her first speech.

It was an occasion the Shawsheen Mill handsnever forgot. Salome, always well and appropriatelydressed, had not slighted them by refusingto appear at her best. She wore a whiteChina silk costume, rightly thinking her youngpeople would be readily reached by the gospelof good clothes. Her gown was simplymade, but fitted exquisitely her well-proportionedfigure. Neck and wrists were finishedwith beautiful old point lace, and she did notscorn to wear her grandmother’s diamonds.

Her attractive appearance, her cordialand interested manner, and her winningvoice had pleaded her cause with the criticaloperatives before she had uttered a half-dozensentences. Her sincerity and earnestness wentstraight to their sensibilities, and, before shehad suspected it, every heart in the room washers.

“My dear friends,” she began, “Inever made a speech in my life, and cannot152now. I never stood on a platform before; andonly my interest in every one of you brings mehere to-night. I only want to say that thisbuilding, which you see now for the first time,and which I hope will prove a happy home formany of you, is built to my grandfather’smemory. Some who are present to-night rememberhim and love him still, I hope.”

Here several gray-haired men in the audiencenodded their heads, and one was heard to mutter,“Ay, ay, we do.”

“If he had lived, I think everythingin the factory would have been different.Your lives would have been different; and mine,too, perhaps. For one thing, I don’t believeyou and I would have grown up strangers toeach other. You know, by this time, I am sure,that I have a glorious plan for making theShawsheen Mills the best on earth.

“Not by tearing down mills and buildingnew and more elegant ones; not alone by makingcostly improvements; but by having—andmind, this is the only way it can be done,—byhaving the best and most conscientious and intelligentclass of operatives in this country,—andthat will mean, of course, in the world.153Now, you all know I cannot do this alone;every one of you has a part in carrying outthis plan of mine. And unless you all agreeto help, it will fail. Don’t think I want you todo any impossible thing. I only want everyone of you to be the best and do the best youpossibly can. You and I are going to havesome splendid times in the future. We’regoing to get better acquainted with each other.We are going to become real friends. On yourpart, you are going to deserve my good opinionand my honest friendship; on my part, I’mgoing to deserve your confidence and trust andlove; and between us we are going to showthe people of Massachusetts that a cotton-factorycan become something more than agreat machine to grind out yards and yards ofunbleached sheeting; and that its operativescan become something better and greater thanso many smaller wheels in the machinery. Wewill show that a factory community may be, andis, a prosperous, happy, contented and intelligentpeople.”

Some of the young men could contain themselvesno longer, and broke into enthusiasticapplause as Salome uttered the last sentiment.154Villard chuckled secretly as he observed thatthe leaders in it were the heads of the committeesin the recent strike.

“I’m so glad you agree with me,” saidSalome heartily, when the noise had subsided.“Now, I want to tell you about this house.The rooms are all ready for occupancy. I thinkthere are accommodations for all who care tocome. You are to leave the old boardinghouseson the corporation, and I shall have themtaken down at once. The price of board willremain the same as at the old houses. Thereading-rooms are ready, the library is yours,and we shall soon find means of entertainmentand work, which will keep us all contented, Ihope. Mr. Villard will occupy rooms on thisfloor, and the matron, whom I will shortly presentto you, will be on the girls’ wing. Therewill be but few rules, and those, I trust, notirksome. I cannot imagine that any one willnot be willing to obey them. The new houseson the hill are all ready for the families on thecorporation to move into. A few of the largerand better houses are to be let at an increasedrental; but most of them will be let at theold rates. We have a plan, by which any155one who wants to, may, after a little, buy a houseand pay for it by monthly installments, justthe same as you pay rent. But I will not gointo details. Mr. Fales will be at the first cottageon the hill, and you can all make arrangementswith him at any time after to-morrowmorning. Now I have talked too long, I know,and am going to stop. I want to have youhear what Mr. Burnham and Mr. Villard haveto say; but first we must have some music.”

If Salome could have read the tremblingwaves of sympathy and reverence which werealready vibrating from the hearts of the youngpeople whom she had addressed, she would nothave sat down with the feeling of self-distrustand failure which followed her speech. Theexperience, the very atmosphere, was unique inthe history of industrial experiments.

The two superintendents followed the bandwith speeches that were characteristic of each.Burnham’s, witty and tinged with sarcasm, butfriendly and cordial enough; and Villard’s,strong with earnest purpose and full of brotherlylove. The matron, Mrs. French, was presented,also, and her few remarks won afriendly recognition among the young folks;156and then Salome announced that the meetingwould adjourn to the dining-rooms in thebasement.

More refined audiences than hers have notbeen slow to exchange an atmosphere of sentimentand intellectuality for one of prosaicsalads and cold meats, and more fanciful icesand coffee; and the Shawsheen operatives weresoon encountering a more æsthetic collation,it is probable, than had ever been served thembefore. But as it was a bountiful one, theyacted well their part and found no fault.

The crowning delight of the evening cameafterward. The young men were asked tolend a hand, and soon the floor was clearedin the large hall, and word was circulatedthrough the house that the evening’s entertainmentwould close with dancing. Nothingcould have gone so far toward convincingthe mill-hands that Salome had meant whatshe said, than this concession to their socialrights, unless it was the fact that she, herself,—thehaughty, aristocratic daughter of FloydShepard, whom they had looked upon withenvy not unmixed with hatred,—that she shouldlead the dance with the younger superintendent.157An orchestra of three pieces was selectedfrom the band of musicians, and Marion andSalome, by turns, furnished the piano accompaniment.Salome claimed her promise fromVillard and danced merrily, not only the firstfigure but several others. Mrs. Soule was toomuch overcome by all she had seen and heardto endure this, and was taken home; but theothers staid until the midnight hour tolled, andthe dancers had all bidden good-night to theirnewly-developed friends and gone home enthusiasticin their praise of the new order ofthings in the millrégime, and, especially, ofthe woman who was opening to them the widerdoors of opportunity.

John Villard passed a wakeful night inhis new rooms at Newbern Shepard Hall. Astrange and unwonted feeling had taken possessionof him; one which he was slow torecognize, but which cried loudly to him ofhis folly and presumption, even while it refusedto be put off.

After that first dance, Salome had paused byan open window and he had stood idly watchingher. Suddenly a tremendous desire toclasp her in his arms, to hold her close, todemand her full surrender, swept over him. Sosudden and strong was the passion, that it waswith difficulty that he kept from seizing thesoft hand which lay dangerously near on thewindow-sill. So over-mastering was it, that hedared not stay or even speak. He turned onhis heel and went out under the quiet stars,alone.

159In the days when she had held aloof fromthe mill, and the superintendents scarcely eversaw her, Geoffrey Burnham had regarded heras “something too bright and good for humannature’s daily food,” looking upon her as immenselyabove him, socially speaking. Butnow that she had become familiarly associatedwith them in the daily affairs and interests ofthe mill, Burnham thought of her as havingentered the field of good comradeship, andfelt that friendly, if not exactly equal, termsexisted between them.

With John Villard it was different. He hadbegun by looking with a certain degree ofscorn upon a woman who held tremendous interestsso lightly as she had done in the olddays. He had felt for her all the contempt aman who does not know them—a man withserious purposes—may feel for the irresponsiblebutterflies he imagines society-girls to be. Withher deeper interest in the side of life whichinterested him, and her efforts to raise thestandard of the mills, her realization of whatto him was a sacred object in life and her devotionto it, his thought of her had changed.

With him, familiar every-day contact had not160made of her a comrade, in the ordinary senseof the word. Her beauty and refinement, togetherwith the consciousness which never lefthis sensitive soul, that it was her wealth andher generosity which made the new conditionspossible,—these things only served to raise herto a pedestal where she stood, forever apartfrom the rest of the universe,—a woman to berevered and worshiped; not a woman to beaspired to.

Suddenly, he found himself in love with her.The tide of feeling which swept over him wasone that no man could mistake. It was notenough that he might worship her on herpedestal, with a devotion silent and unknown.He wanted to hold her in his arms. He wantedher eyes to droop before his glance—not tolook at him in the steady fashion he knew sowell. He wanted to feel her heart beatingagainst his. He wanted to kiss her.

“Poor fool!” he told himself, a hundredtimes that night. “As if she would even lookat me—a poor factory-boy, self-educated, self-trained,and—yes, self-conceited!”

He remembered his youth; how poor he hadbeen; how he had studied by moonlight to161save the expense of a candle; how he hadworked all through his boyhood in a cotton-mill,that he might help his older sister to supporttheir mother; how, after his mother haddied and his sister married, he had remainedpoor and alone and almost friendless; howlittle he had seen and known of women; howutterly lacking he was in all the graces of societyand the refinements that he supposed tocome from outward polish only; in short, howutterly at variance with her tastes and interestsand aims his life had been.

He remembered her life of luxury, of travel,of careful training, and the indulgence ofcultivated, æsthetic tastes. What was he, thathe should dare to even think of her? Whatbut a presumptuous fool, that he should dreamof touching even her frail, white hand? Andyet, her eyes had drooped when they met histhat day, when they all went over the Halltogether. Stay—what did it mean? Did she?—couldshe feel?—but, no. He was a presumptuousidiot to think of it.

He paced the floor for an hour. Then helit a cigar and, under its peaceful influences, hetried again to fix his mind on the mills, on the162changed condition of things, on anything,—buther. Still, constantly, over and over, hertall, white-robed figure took shape in the curlingwreaths of vapor, and he fell to dreamingwhat it would be like to have a happy home ofhis own, with her as its center and joy.

Again, he was exasperated with himself andcalled himself hard names. He threw away thehalf-smoked weed and resolutely prepared forbed; but only to toss wearily about, combatinghimself on the old grounds until the dawn,pushing its way through the crevices of hisblinds, told him to rise and set his face againtoward the workaday world. It was the firsttime that hard-working, earnest, practical JohnVillard had ever passed a sleepless night.

He had hardly seen how he was to bear thedaily contact with Salome, after that. He wastoo modest and too honest with himself todream that there might be any hope for him.He had, at one time during the night, thoughtof leaving the mills, and going away to try anew and easier life than this promised to be.Then he called himself a coward and rememberedher words:

“I have depended on you from the first,”163and he determined to stay, cost what it might.Besides, all his hopes and interests were withthe Shawsheen workers. No: he could notleave them, he could not leave her now.

So he went forth in the morning, unchangedin outward appearance, and yet, stronger andbetter for this first grand fight with himself.And he met her with his usual deferential bowand smile when, by and by, she came to theoffice for her usual morning’s study of businessaffairs.

It was unanimously agreed that the openingof the Hall had been a grand success. Themill-hands, themselves, seemed to feel the newattitude into which they had suddenly stepped,and were already brighter and more hopeful.

On her way to the mills, Salome had met ayoung overseer, who was hurrying in to townfor something. She greeted him pleasantly,calling him by name, when, to her surprise, hestopped.

“I’d like to thank you, Miss Shepard,” theburly young fellow began, “for what you aredoing for us. If all the employers took theinterest in their operatives as you do in us,we’d want no more Unions, and there’d be no164more strikes. I’m thinking you’ve got aheadof the rest of us on the labor question, andfound the right answer to it.”

“I’m very glad to hear you say that,”Salome answered, with a glow at her heartwhich no speech from a man of the world hadever produced. “I want to find it, if I haven’tyet. But, you know it doesn’t depend onme alone. I may try, as hard as I can, but ifyou people don’t co-operate with me, I’m helpless.I want to depend on you, Mr. Brady.”

“And you can that, miss,” was the heartyanswer. “You’ve got us all on your side now,sure. I went up this morning to see the houses.They are fine ones, too.”

“And did you pick out one for yourself, Mr.Brady? You are married, I believe?”

“I am that; and I’ve got as good a wife asever the saints sent to bless a man. Yes, Ipicked out the one I liked best; but thewoman’ll have to see it first, you know. Andthen, do you know, I think I’ll buy it. Theterms are so easy, and I’ve a little money laidby, that I’d like to use; and I’m thinkingCarrie’d be happier in a home of our own.”

“Now, that’s sensible of you,” said Salome,165delighted that her houses were in such goodprospect of pleasing. “If you do it, I’ve nodoubt a good many others will. And, by andby, we shall have quite a community of propertyowners.”

Brady straightened himself up unconsciouslyat the word, touched his hat and passed on,his heart warmed and gratified by the kindlynotice; while Salome entered the office inunusually good spirits.

“It seems to me,” she began, addressing herselfto Burnham, “that everything is swinginground into the circle of my plans far betterthan I had dared hope. I expected opposition,or at least indifference, on the part of theoperatives. On the contrary, they are all asdelighted with the state of affairs as I am.”

“Why shouldn’t they be?” was Burnham’scomment. “They’d be ungrateful wretchesif they weren’t. They’ve far more to gainthan you have to lose, remember.”

“But you’ve been trying to make me believe,”pursued Salome, “that they didn’t want theircondition improved; that they were satisfied tobe let alone; and that they’d resist every improvementI offered.”

166“Wait a little and see;” Burnham tried tomake his tone impartial, if not skeptical;“you’ve only begun yet. Don’t expect thehabits of months and years, the loose customsand low tastes, are going to be overthrown ina single night. The affair of last night, forinstance, was doubtless the most orderly entertainmentand the quietest dance they ever had.But it don’t follow that they will all of them besatisfied to drop entirely the old order of lowdances when they had plenty to drink, even ifthey didn’t have salads and coffee, or ice-creamand cake. There’s no telling how many ofthem will be stealing off to those places beforewinter is over.”

“Then we must get up some form ofentertainment that will hold them to us,”said Salome firmly. “They sha’n’t fallback, if anything we can compass can savethem.”

Villard looked across his big ledger at her,as if she had been an angel sent from Heavendirect, to preach a higher political economy tothe cotton factories of earth. She caught hislook and smiled back at him; but she said nomore.

“How do you like your new quarters, Mr.Villard?” she said, then. “I hope you restedwell last night?”

Villard remembered his sleepless hoursvaguely, as in a dream. She looked so brightand untroubled herself.

“You deserted me after that first dance.Did I dance so badly that you feared or dreadedto be caught by me again? If it hadn’t beenfor Mr. Burnham and Mr. Fales I should havefelt quite a wall-flower.”

“Well, as soon as the young people get movedin we must start some classes. I know a gooddressmaker whom I can get, and Marion willteach them some other things, if they want it.”

She lingered some minutes, talking over theHall and her plans, and left him with a confusedimage of herself mixing up with thefigures of the ledger in a most incongruous way.Alas! John Villard was to have many a hardfight with himself before he could drive awaythat image at will.

168The young operatives—and all that dweltwithin the corporation boarding-house walls—beganthat very night to pick up their effects,and make ready to move into their new quarters.Mrs. French had all she could attend to in preparingfor her large family, assigning rooms, andattending to the thousand details of openingthe Hall. But before the week was closed,every old boarding-house was closed and thenew home full.

Marion Shaw found her time altogetheroccupied. Her work was to lie directly amongthe girls, as Villard’s influence was to save theboys and young men. Marion had a gentleand pleasing manner that made friends everywhereshe went. She had had a good deal ofexperience in managing boarding-school girls,and although they are a widely different classfrom factory girls, human nature—girl-nature,is the same everywhere. Before the weekwas over, Marion had made friends with manyof the girls, and had already interested themin keeping their rooms tidy, in forming a girls’club, which should embrace all sorts ofgood ends, and in rousing in them what was ofinfinite value in the work she had laid out,—a169desire to become as near like her and Salomeas it was possible for them to be.

“We shall have to endure the cross ofhaving them cut all their dresses like ours,wear ribbons like ours, do up their hair likeours, and get up the most astonishing hatspurporting to be like ours,” said she to Salomeone night; “but if it all comes of their wantingto be like us,—you understand me, dear,—Imean of their wanting to reach a higherideal of course,—we can bear it.”

“We shall have to,” was the answer.“The truth of it is, they will be trying to copyour habits and manners and characters, too.”

Life to Marion Shaw was a serious thing.Although she was but twenty-seven years old,she had come to realize that life may not befor any what the fancy of youth pictures it;and even to realize that the highest goodwhich life can hold is not to be happy.Already she knew that happiness is but arelative term, and that only by ceasing to searchand plan for it, can any of us find it even insmall degree.

170Just now, she walked dangerously near tohappiness. On the opening night, GeoffreyBurnham had kept closely at her side all theevening, and after the affair was over, he hadwalked home with her, while Robert Fales hadgone ahead with Salome.

At the door, the two had paused a little,looking at the exquisite, moonlit October night.Suddenly the extraordinary interest Burnhamhad felt in this young woman had culminated.He seized both her hands in his, and pressedthem close to his breast.

“Why have you not come to me before?”he murmured, passionately. “Why have youwaited all these years?”

One evening in January, Salome and Marionwent over early to Newbern Shepard Hall.Marion’s duties called her there every evening,and she was seldom unaccompanied by herfriend.

The success of Salome’s schemes for the interestof the working-girls seemed alreadyassured. Although the Hall had been openbut little more than two months, classes indressmaking and millinery and in domesticscience were already established, and were wellattended. Some girls there were, it is true,who felt that, after working all day, they wereentitled to an idle evening, or to the right ofamusing themselves after their own fashion.But plenty of young women had been foundto open the classes, and the number was steadilyincreasing. No strong measures had been172taken to induce these girls to join. Marionhad talked with some of them individually, atfirst, and found a few who, half skeptically,had consented to try the dressmaking class, asan experiment. Then the announcement wasmade that a class would be opened on a certainnight, and twenty-six girls were present.Instruction in sewing, cutting and fitting wasgiven free to any woman connected with theShawsheen Mills. As the girls had been payingexorbitant prices for having cheap materialpoorly made up, and as Salome had providedinstructors from the best dressmaking establishmentShepardtown afforded, the girls werenot slow to see the benefit that would come tothem.

The young wives of operatives, too, womenwith houses and children to care for, thenbegan to avail themselves of the privilegeswhich the class afforded. So that, on this Januaryevening, there were over a hundred andfifty women in the classes, and another roomhad been opened to them on the groundfloor.

It was the same with other classes. At first,the young women had joined with the older173ones in “pooh-poohing” the cooking andhousekeeping lectures and demonstrations.The idea that they and their mothers did notknow how to cook, and that Salome, who knewabsolutely nothing of such matters, essayed toteach them, was a most distasteful one. Butwhen they found that a celebrated teacher wasto come out twice a week from Boston, and givedemonstrations in the model class-rooms below,and that a graduate of the Boston CookingSchool had been engaged to take charge ofthe lessons every evening, they, the youngmarried women from the cottages, especially,dropped in from curiosity; and although theyhad come to scoff, they remained to cook. Inshort, they had become deeply interested in thenew ways of housekeeping, and were surprisedand delighted to find a way of making theirfew dollars go farther and procure a better andmore healthful living. Consequently, theseclasses, too, were full, although the oldermatrons did not yet give up their prejudices.

Among the girls who had not yet joined theclasses, there were many who sat quietly intheir own rooms or in the large reading-rooms,and enjoyed the current magazines and papers,174or gossiped quietly and harmlessly about thefashions and each other—not altogether unlikewomen of higher pretensions. It was astonishing,even to Salome, who had, from the first,believed in her girls, how few of them wentout on the streets at night.

“It is not astonishing to me,” said Marion,that January evening, in reply to a remark fromher friend to this effect. “The girls are tiredat night and are only too glad to have a pleasant,light and steam-heated place to stay in. Theirrooms at the old boardinghouses were cold, barrenand dismal. In winter weather they couldnot sit in them, and the so-called parlor was notmuch better. When I was at Mme. Blanc’sone of her servant girls went wrong. I shallnever forget something she said. When Madameheard of it, she sent for the girl and askedher, bitterly, what had made her bring such ascandalous thing upon a select house like hers.I was in her room at the time. The poor girllooked up at Mme. Blanc and said, ‘O, ma’am,you’re awful particular about where your youngladies spend their evenings,—girls that you’repaid for looking after. But us servant girls—howdid you look after us? You didn’t allow175us a light in our own rooms, or to speak abovea whisper in the kitchen, or seem to think we washuman beings at all. What else could we do,but go out on the street when we wanted a bitof freedom? And once, on the street, ma’am,girls like us ain’t never safe. If you’d lookedout for me, ma’am, and treated me as well asyou treat your own dog or cat, it would neverhave happened.’ Poor Madame was overcomeentirely, and the girl left her white with rage.But she looked after her servants more closelyafterward, and kept them in at night in warmrooms. I don’t believe our girls want to dowrong,—especially if we make it comfortablefor them to do right.”

On the young men’s side, things had goneequally well. There was a class of them who,like their fathers before them, were sturdy,honest and faithful. It was a small class, butupon these John Villard depended to counteractthe influence of the lower foreign elementthat had crept in; and to the pride of thesehe appealed, both directly and indirectly, inhis efforts to establish a better social atmosphereamong the operatives.

With a few of these to begin with, he had176opened an evening school on the other wing ofthe Hall; and, as in the case of the women’sclasses, it had increased in numbers and interestfrom the start. The overseers, almost to aman, gladly availed themselves of its opportunitiesfor the education that the true Americanalways feels the need for; and they, with thebetter class of men from the looms and mules,set the example for others to follow.

No better man for the work could have beenchosen than John Villard. He had come upunder much the same conditions that governedthem. He had begun on the lowest round,and worked up to the position he now occupied,by hard work and the closest application tobusiness. This fact, together with his attitudetoward them during the strike, had made hima favorite with nearly every man on the works.They felt that they could place the utmostconfidence in Villard; and in the ShawsheenMills, as everywhere, a rugged sincerity andhonesty of purpose carried a weight that eventhe most unstable felt.

The lecture-hall was usually packed at theweekly entertainment which Salome provided,and a new feeling of content and self-respect177had begun to permeate the mills. Make aman who has been looked upon as a meremachine feel that he is estimated at somethingnear the worth which every human being feelsin his heart that he is entitled to, and you havedone much to raise him to a higher socialstandard. For the first time since old NewbernShepard’s day, the mill-hands began to feela just pride in being individual Americancitizens. Unconsciously, both men and womenwere setting their faces toward the higherstandards which Villard by his life, andSalome by her newly awakened energy, hadset for them.

At the mills, affairs were on a most flourishingbasis. The Shawsheen brand of cloth wastoo well known to allow of a few months shutdownof the mills making any difference in thelaw of demand. Orders had increased, evenwhile the mills were closed, and they had beenworked to their utmost capacity ever since theyhad opened. Never had the Shawsheen Millsbeen more prosperous than at the beginning ofJanuary, or their future looked brighter.

When Villard had opened his evening schoolhe invited Burnham to co-operate with him;178but the latter had put him off without adefinite reply, and not until the afternoon ofthe day referred to in the beginning of thischapter had Villard asked him whether or nothe might count on his assistance. Burnhamoccasionally looked in at the Hall of an evening,but Villard had begun to suspect that thiswas principally for the purpose of seeingMarion Shaw.

“Well, to tell the truth,” Burnham finallyadmitted, “I’ve no taste for this sort of thing.Oh, yes; it’s a good scheme, and seems to beworking first-rate; but I’m not the right fellowfor the place. I don’t like philanthropic work,never did, never shall. I work hard enoughduring the day. I need rest and freedom atnight.”

“And I suppose I don’t do anything day-timesand need this sort of thing as recreationand intellectual stimulus?” His tone wassarcastic, for he had little patience with selfishnessin any form.

“No, not that,” said Burnham. “Youwork hard enough—too hard, in fact. But allthis is more in your line. You’re like Miss179Shepard; you’re both of you happier workingyourselves to death for others. Now, I’m notbuilt on that plan. I’ve no faculty for teaching,and I’m sure that my well-meant efforts tomeet the men half-way are looked upon bythem as condescension on my part.”

“I can’t help it. I wasn’t born to the manor,so to speak. I didn’t come up from the ranks,as you know. I suppose they’d believe in memore, if I had. But you know that myfather put me under Mr. Greenough to learnthe business, only after I had graduated fromcollege and fooled away a year in Europe. Isometimes doubt if I’m not out of place in thismill as it is run nowadays.”

“Oh, no, not that,” put in Villard hastily.“You’re too good a business man. We couldn’tspare you.”

“I can see how it’s all coming out,” Burnhamcontinued, as if he had not heard Villard.“You two” (Villard’s heart jumped at thewords) “will go on and make a model institutionof the Shawsheen Mills. I shoulddoubt if you made a profitable one, only that I180know you’ve got a mighty good business headon your shoulders; and, I say, the way MissShepard is developing is a caution to us men.I’d no idea she’d take such a practical turn, orlearn the details so readily. Oh, I can see whereit’s going to end. She’ll be the recognized headand you’ll be her first assistant. As for me, Isha’n’t be in it. I shall have resigned.”

“Jeff!” It was only occasionally that thesetwo called each other by their boyhood names.

“Yes, I don’t think I should care to have itknown that I worked under a woman, muchas I admire and respect Miss Shepard. There’dbe no other way, unless I married her!”

“Don’t think I’d have much chance there,though,” Burnham went on lightly. “You’remore her style. And you’re both so muchwrapped up in good works that you’ve no timefor faith in each other, beyond what you wastein philanthropic effort. Miss Shepard don’tseem to be the marrying kind. I don’t believeshe ever thinks of a man unless he has themerit of being an operative in the mills.”

“And since you’re bent on discussing matrimonial181matters,” observed Villard, with sarcasm,“how about Miss Shaw? And when are thewedding-cards to be issued?”

“Marion Shaw is a fine girl,” he said. “She’sthe right kind of woman to tie to; but”—andBurnham took up his hat to go out—“I’m notthe marrying kind either.”

So Villard had come to understand that hemust take care of his evening school as besthe could alone.

Robert Fales had settled in Shepardtown.There were to be more cottages built in thespring, and to him Salome had alone confided herplan of erecting a new church which should benamed for her grandfather. When the eveningschool began to grow, he went to Villard andoffered his services as assistant, and had proveda most valuable one.

This evening Salome looked in upon them,and asked Villard if he could give her a fewmoments after the class.

“I shall be very glad,” he replied. “I havebeen working up the idea you spoke about theother day, and wanted to talk with you about it.”

182“The profit-sharing scheme?” asked Salome.“That’s just what I wanted to speak of. Itseems to me we ought, now, at the beginning ofthe year, to get it into manageable shape, andtell the men, so that they may know what toexpect. I will be in the reception-room whenyour class is through.”

Much as Villard was interested in his workthe remaining hour dragged a little. Theprospect of a quiettête-à-tête with Salome, evenon so unromantic a subject as profit-sharing,was too alluring.

But, at last, he found himself face to facewith her, and for a few moments forgot all elsein the pleasure of listening to her voice andwatching the curve of her chin and mobile lips,as she talked of immaterial things.

“And now, what kind of a plan have youformulated as to the profit-sharing?” sheasked, after a little.

“Profits—oh, yes,” said Villard, suddenlybrought to himself. “I have examined allthe accounts of such experiments in foreigncountries, and tried to remember the differingconditions and better wages here. I haveprepared a rough draft of a circular which I183thought perhaps you might like to send outamong the hands. Do you want to see it?”

“I don’t pretend it is complete, you know,”he went on, drawing a folded paper from hisinner pocket. “It is only an abstract, but—hereit is.”

He would rather have had her read it, whilehe watched her face; but he complied.

“For some time past,” the circular read,“the subject of co-operation in some form hasbeen considered by the Shawsheen Mills.Believing that capital and labor are interdependentand their interests identical, it hasbeen decided to adopt some plan by which thelaborer may obtain a share of the product inproportion to the profits of the scheme, at thesame time guaranteeing his wages against thetime of loss.

“It is now proposed, therefore, to divide asum among the Shawsheen employes, each yearin which there are surplus profits, over andabove wages earned.

“Understand, that before anything can beset apart for this purpose, wages must be paid,184interest must be paid, and a fair profit oncapital must be paid. In addition to this, anadditional amount must be set aside to makegood the wear and tear of buildings and machinery,and to strengthen reserve funds againsta time of depression.

“Ordinarily, the sum above all these amountsmust be small, and must differ, of course, withthe fluctuations of the market, the depression oftrade, and the wear of machinery from year toyear. It will be readily seen, also, that thesum to be divided will be enlarged by extracare and attention on the part of employes.Every weaver who makes a mis-pick, everyburler who slights her work, every spinner whomakes a needless knot; in short, every personwho makes an unnecessary waste of any kind,makes the amount to be divided smaller, bymaking a loss to the concern; and, on theother hand, if every person in the mill attendsto the little savings, the wool-washers savingevery scrap of wool, the spinners making lesswaste, the weavers weaving up the wholebobbin, and so on through all the branches, agreat saving can be made which will effectuallyincrease the sum to be divided; and it will be185for the direct interest of every employe toexercise such increased care and diligence.

“The mode of distributing this bonus will beby making a dividend of so much per cent. uponthe wages earned by each person. If, after allcontingencies are provided for, there is notenough left to make a dividend of one percent., no dividend will be made for that year.In case of a dividend it will be paid on andafter the first day of May in each year to allemployes who have been in employ at theShawsheen Mills for at least seven monthsduring the year, and shall not have beendischarged for drunken or disorderly conduct.The amount of wages earned during the yearpreceding the first of April shall be theamount upon which the bonus for each individualshall be computed.

“The profit for the present year, if there bea dividend, will be paid on or after the firstday of May. Let every person connected withthe mills work so faithfully, making everyeffort toward a wise economy, that the firstdividend shall be an encouraging one.”

John Villard stopped reading the circularand looked across at Salome. She was regarding186him with a fixed look of admiration andreverence, such as a good woman feels for butone man in a lifetime. For an instant hispulses leaped; but he was too modest a man tobelieve in his own good fortune.

His words brought her to herself. Herexpression faded to one of mere brightness,and became less frankly honest.

“I think it capital,” she said. “I do not seehow it can be improved. Will you let me takeit home and consider it?”

“Of course,” he assented. “You know Ido not pretend it is perfect. But it seems tome we risk nothing in trying it.”

Salome rose to go and reached out her handfor the manuscript. Some pieces had fallenon the table and in gathering them up, theirhands brushed against each other.

An electric thrill shot through the frame ofeach. Salome stood, blushing and sweet,suddenly conscious that a crucial moment inher life had come. Had Villard but spoken,had he but clasped the hand that still remainednear his!

187But, ever depreciating himself and knowingabsolutely nothing of the heart of woman, heturned abruptly away, bringing Salome backto herself with a hasty “good-evening.” Andthen he strode away to the outer air, askinghimself, savagely, why he was so weak andboyish because a pretty woman happened totouch his hand.

All through the winter months, GeoffreyBurnham and Marion Shaw were constantlymeeting. As Burnham had intimated to Villard,he had taken only a superficial interestin the philanthropic or ethical side of mill-economy.But he was often at the Hall of anevening; and upon pleasant nights, when theladies walked over from the Shepard mansion,he accompanied them home after the evening’sengagement. If it were early, as on ordinaryoccasions, he went in and sat chatting withthem for an hour or two. Mrs. Soule alwayswelcomed him, and although she never went tothe Hall, she found ample opportunities oftelling him how many lonely hours it causedher.

“I often wish Salome cared half as much,”she used plaintively to say on these occasions,“for a living aunt as for a dead grandfather.”

189Often, Burnham sang to Salome’s accompaniment,his rich tenor voice lending pathos,and his ardent glances a meaning, for Marionin the love-songs he sang so well. The lattersat silent at such times, a quiet content wrappingher round, forgetting the past, ignoringthe future.

“A blind man’s paradise,” she told herself itwas, as the weeks rolled by, and the glamourof a scarcely hinted but very evident passionwaited in vain for more than the vaguest expression.

Sometimes the two were left alone for awhile, when the conversation took a fitful tone,as if uncertain whether to be light and frivolous,or tender and deep. Several times Burnhamhad seized Marion’s unresisting hand andkissed it passionately; and, finally, one eveningwhen they were alone, he had put his armabout her waist and drawn her close to him.

“Why have we not had each other all theseyears?” he asked, looking into her sweet, confusedeyes. “What cruel fate has kept youfrom me?”

“It does not matter, does it, so long as wehave each other now?” Marion had asked in190reply. And then he had bent and kissed thepure white brow and the clustering rings ofhair.

After this, every night, Marion, kneeling byher bedside alone, thanked God for the lovethat had come to brighten her bereaved life.

And Burnham? Did he realize what hemight be doing when he won this true andloyal woman’s heart? At first, he, too, washappy in the present. The past held nothingwhich he was proud to remember; and into thefuture he stubbornly refused to look. He had,for years,—“since his days of adolescence,”he told himself,—had no interest in women,although he knew that, in a place like Shepardtown,he was the object of several fond mammas’machinations, and the admiration of mostof the village girls. He had never metMarion’s counterpart. She interested and fascinatedhim. Simple and childish in manyways, she was grave and dignified in others.Her life, he could see, would be spent forothers. She was one of those women who area constant sacrifice to the world around them;who give openly and always of their best, askingand expecting little in return. In short-Burnham191knew it as well as any one could—shewas a woman whose life and love andutmost service would be absorbed by a selfishman, only to be as unappreciated as they wereundeserved on his part. And yet, ever sincetheir first meeting, months before, there hadbeen that subtle consciousness of each otherdrawing them on, that wave of feeling onmeeting, that positive yearning when they wereseparated.

After Villard’s pointed questioning regardingMarion, Burnham began to question himselfseriously. At first, when thoughts of thefuture had intruded into his calm moments, hethought of her as his wife; of himself as settleddown in a house of his own; he even expectedto be happy. But he did not put his thoughtsinto words. When he was with Marion, heavoided—not so much from intention perhapsas from a reluctance to break the spell of romancewhich hung over them—any mentionof different relations in the future.

It was April before he brought himself toface about and look at the subject, calmly andseriously. Just where was he drifting withMarion?

192One day he allowed himself to let fall someremark about her to Villard,—not in any wayimplying their peculiar relations, but yet speakingof her in such a way that Villard drew himselfup to his straightest, and looked him inthe eye a full moment. Not a word was said,but at that instant, Burnham felt the disagreeableconsciousness of being a scoundrel.

He went home that evening and tried to read.Then he tried to smoke. Then he thought ofgoing over to the Shepard mansion. He finallydecided on sitting down and squarely meetingan issue that should have been faced six monthsbefore.

Geoffrey Burnham was thirty-seven years old.He had considered only his own taste anddesires ever since he was born. When he wasa boy, if he had wanted anything, he had it.If his father did not grant his every wish hismother would. And she, poor woman, hadfostered in him the idea that all his personal,imperious desires were meant, always, to beimmediately granted. The conquering of Selfhad been no part of his early discipline.

His father died when he was in Europe.When he came home, and entered the mills,—an193arrangement the father effected just before hisdecease,—his pretty, white-faced mother hadcome to Shepardtown to be near her son. Forhim she lived and would die. Yielding weaklyin everything to him, she avenged her positionby setting herself against all other women.Salome had called upon her, and had invitedher to her house, but in vain. Mrs. Burnhamwent nowhere, and wanted to see no one. Herson was all in all to her. And but for theconstant fear that he would marry the handsomeMiss Shepard, who, with all her wealth, shefelt sure, would crowd her completely out ofher son’s heart and home, she would have beena comparatively happy woman. Incredible tolarger-hearted women, as it seems, there arewomen so selfish in their devotion to an onlyson, as to wreck his life, so far as its beingof any practical value to himself and others isconcerned, by the strength of their ownweak persistence.

Burnham thought of his mother. He rememberedthe comfortable habits he had settledinto; he wondered if any other woman wouldever let him smoke in the best room in thehouse, or submit to his will when he chose, as194he often did for days together, to speak onlyin monosyllables in his own house. He feltthat, should he marry, his habits would allhave to be changed; that the solitude whichhe prized, when he felt so inclined, might beabsolute no longer. He remembered hismother’s peculiarities, and said to himself thatthere would be a devil of a row, should heundertake to bring a wife home. There mightbe constant bickerings, and that he nevercould abide. No; better let women alone.

Then he thought of Marion and sighed.Her tender eyes, when he parted from her twonights before, came up before him.

“Hang it,” he asked himself; “just howfar have I gone with her, anyway?”

He felt himself a scoundrel again, to hiscredit be it written. But then, there were thehabits of a lifetime, and his mother to beremembered. Could he overthrow all hisestablished convictions?

And yet, just what might Marion beexpecting of him? No, he had given her nodefinite encouragement in words. Still, onenever can tell how a good, pure woman isgoing to take these things.

195Burnham went out under the April sky andwalked up and down the concrete walk bareheaded,until his mother, from her window,reminded him for the third time that he wouldcertainly get cold out there; and shouldn’tshe make him a cup of hot negus? Then hecame in and renewed the conflict.

“I’ve let the thing run too long,” he saidto himself, as he gazed into the open wood-fire,having refused the decoction his mother hadpatiently brought him. “I’ll have a reckoningwith myself to-night, and decide this thingonce for all.”

Burnham was a decided man, and, oncedetermined, seldom changed his mind. Heboasted, sometimes, of that quality, forgettingthat it is only an ignorant or an unprogressivesoul which will never acknowledge itself in thewrong, or change its course from the one markedout, perhaps in obstinacy or error.

Until midnight he argued with himself,although, unconsciously, his mind had beensecretly made up at the start. When the clockstruck twelve he rose and got together hiswriting materials.

He had fully decided that it would be folly196for him to marry Marion Shaw. She was ararely devoted, unselfish woman, and a mostlovable one; but he knew himself, he said, andif she married him she would do so only to beunhappy in the end. She could not be otherwise,living with him and his mother.

But how was he to withdraw from the delicatesituation in which he had foolishly placedhimself? There was, he decided, but one way.

For a year, now, Salome Shepard had beenmaking a deep and practical study of the millsand their operation. She had proved a wonderfullyapt scholar, her womanly intuition oftengrasping, in a few minutes, details which hehad been months in learning. He doubted if,should occasion require it, she could not runthe mills alone. With Villard—honest, faithfulsoul!—to help her, Burnham felt that therewas no longer any need of his services at theShawsheen Mills. There was another superintendencyin a mill at Lowell which stoodopen to him, whenever he chose to take it.There were some things about it that he wouldnot like; but he must not remain on dangerousground. He took great credit to himselfas he reflected that honor required him not to197trifle with Marion’s feelings another day. Hevirtuously decided to take himself out of herway. Once gone from her she would cease tofeel his attraction and forget the tender scenesbetween them. He would resign his connectionwith the Shawsheen Mills.

He sat down and wrote the letter of resignation.Then he went to bed and slept. He,like Villard, had kept awake hours for awoman. But he was not the man to conquerhis selfish nature, or to grow stronger byfighting himself.

The next morning Salome found Villardalone in the inner office of the mills. A notelay on her desk. It was Burnham’s resignation.

Villard looked as astonished as though adynamite bomb had exploded in the mill-yard.

“Not a word,” he said. “But stay, he didhint at something, months ago; but I nevergave it a second thought. ‘Decided that heis no longer needed on the works, and an198opportunity having offered to better his condition.’H’m! Those are his reasons?Strange he hadn’t mentioned the matter to mealthough itwas his own business.”

“We can try,” was the reply, “but Burnhamis a pretty determined fellow when hefairly makes up his mind. Shall I go overand see him?”

“If you please. Tell him to come backwith you; I want to persuade him to stay if Ican.”

Villard went over to Burnham’s house,but he had already gone to Lowell to completearrangements to enter the new position.Mrs. Burnham knew nothing of either thisplan or her son’s sudden resignation. Villardreturned to Salome.

“What are we going to do,” she asked,“supposing he refuses to come back—even atan increased salary?”

“Don’t you think you and I can run thebusiness alone for a while?” returned Villard,“at least until we can find a good man. Goodsuperintendents don’t grow on every bush.”

199“Do you think I am capable of taking hisplace—with your help, of course?” Salomelooked earnestly at him.

“I think you are quite capable of doinganything noble and great,” he answered,fervently.

“With your help,” she said, in a low tone.“Of course I will do anything, and shall beonly too proud,” she hastened to add, “if Ihave succeeded in learning enough of thebusiness to be of any use.”

Villard looked again at her averted eyes, andchecked an impulse to say something more.Had he known a tenth as much of women asof cotton factories, his fortune and happinesshad been in his own hands. But he honestlythought she had turned away her eyes andspoken the last sentence to turn him away fromsaying more; while she was saying to herselfas she turned to her desk again:

“Will he never, never speak? It will come,some time, I am sure, but will he never dare?”

Burnham returned to Shepardtown only totell his mother that he should go to Lowellimmediately. He had accepted the standingoffer there, and expected to begin at once.

In vain Salome offered him an increase ofsalary. And as he was evidently bent ongoing, she would not urge him to remain inher employ. But both she and Villard couldassign but one reason for his sudden determination.Both felt sure that he had offered himselfto Marion and that she had refused him.

Intimate as Salome and Marion were, nodiscussion of love-matters ever entered theirconversation. With each, love was too highand sacred a thing to be bruited about, evenin a conversation between friends. In theiryounger days, when Marion had shylyannounced her engagement to a young law-student,201there had been no silly or sentimentalwaste of words between them on the subject.And now, perhaps because both women feltthe stirrings of a deep passion in their inmostheart, no reference to the subject was evermade.

When Salome went home to lunch, she toldMarion of Burnham’s resignation; but beyonda momentary look of blank astonishmentMarion’s face gave no sign. And Salome’sfeeling for her friend was too deep and toodelicate, to ask for what she did not choose totell voluntarily.

Burnham would have been glad to leavetown without risking himself in Marion’spresence again.

He feared to trust himself with her, in thepresence of the strange attraction she had heldfor him. But common courtesy demandedthat he should call at the Mansion to leavehis good-byes.

Marion heard the news of his resignationwith a strange sinking of the heart. Somethingtold her that this was the end of herfoolish, happy dream. And although sheloyally refused to acknowledge her doubts,202the strange presaging which was somethingmore than presentiment lurked in her heartall day, and kept her uneasy and restless. Shehalf expected Burnham to come in and by afew words settle the question of their relations.She even asked herself, how she could bestleave Shepardtown if he insisted upon takingher to Lowell.

But he did not come until evening. Thenit happened, as events will in this strangeworld, that she was with her classes at theHall. Salome was unusually tired that eveningand had remained quietly at home. Burnhamdropped in about eight o’clock, sat forhalf an hour with her and Mrs. Soule, andthen bade them good-bye, leaving his adieufor Marion. He did not go to the Hall,although she half expected him all through thelong evening. The next morning he took anearly train for Lowell.

When Marion came home she heard inamazement that Burnham had been there andgone. Salome gave her his word of parting.

“That was all. Tell me, dear,” asked203Salome, for the first time, “was there anytrouble between you? Had you anything todo with his going?”

On the first day of May, the experiment ofprofit-sharing was put into effect for the firsttime at the Shawsheen Mills. In spite of thestrike, and the enforced idleness of severalmonths which had followed, previous to the yearjust passed, this had been a successful one, andwhen the divisions for capital, machinery and reservefund had been set aside, there still remaineda surplus which gave a dividend of four anda half per cent. In some cases, this dividendon wages made a very considerable sum, and inall cases the operatives felt a new sensation ofdirect responsibility and connection with themills. Besides the addition of this money totheir wages, the feeling of brotherhood andownership it engendered was, Villard declared,quite worth the experiment.

Another circular was sent out, urging theoperatives to increased care in saving andpainstaking in order that the dividend mightbe larger another year. And the good results204of the plan were directly manifest in the workof nearly every employe.

A little incident which occurred soon afterthis did much to convince the men of thechanged relations in which they now stoodtowards their employers.

An overseer had been tyrannizing over thespinners until they would endure it no longer.In Mr. Greenough’s day, it is more than probablethat the matter would have culminated ina lock-out or a strike.

But with the new order of things came agreater feeling of confidence in Villard. Fiveof the spinners, therefore, with the consentof the others, went personally to the superintendent.

After hearing their story, Villard promisedto settle their grievance, and quite a discussionof economic questions concerning Capitalversus Labor followed.

“You men have labor to sell,” said Villard,“and we buy it. We have the products ofyour labor to sell, and the commission merchantsand others buy it. As much courtesyand fair dealing should exist between us, as Ilike to have between us and the men to whom205we sell. We would not take insolence from abroker’s clerk; you need not put up with thetyranny of an overseer.”

These words, repeated to the other employes,were the most powerful preventive againststrikes ever tried in the Shawsheen Mills.

As the summer advanced, other new cottageswere built on the hill to accommodate thegrowing demand from the operatives. Allthose built the previous year were occupied,and many of them had been bought on theinstallment plan. Although the communityaround the Shawsheen factories, as it nowexisted, had come suddenly into its new relation,it already represented almost an ideal one.It was already a practical lesson in socialeconomics, which many a reformer and many acapitalist would do well to study. To be acapitalist even in a small way is to learn torespect capital. The fact that these menowned their small plots of ground and theircottages (even if they were mortgaged for thegreater part of their value) was already dignifyingthe laborer by the tangible proof of hisown value.

By this time, Salome had come to know206every family who were in the employ of themills. Was there trouble coming to anyhousehold, was there sickness, was there afflictionamong them, they all turned to her forhelp and sympathy, encouragement or congratulation.The smallest events—the birthof a baby, the progress of measles, the loveaffairs of the young, the querulous complaintsof the old—were all of interest to her; andthey, in return, appreciated her kindness andreturned it with a loyalty of service that didher soul good.

Salome often declared, laughingly, thather relations to them were truly patriarchal.An atmosphere of content and friendlinessprevailed where there had been jealousy andbickering.

The popular entertainments were kept upduring the summer. There were concerts, atwhich local talent (often some operative whopossessed the faculty of singing a song)appeared. Salome, herself, often presided atthe piano, and Marion frequently lent hervoice; their theory being that young people whotook little or no vacation in summer neededsome sort of recreation in summer as in winter.

207Towards the close of the summer, as Salomecame out of the Hall one evening, one of theyoung men came up to her side, and asked ifhe might speak to her alone.

“Certainly,” she said; “Mr. Fales, will youwalk ahead with Marion, while O’Donovanwalks home with me?”

She remembered the young fellow perfectly.She had seen him first during the strike, ahandsome young dare-devil who seemed, infact, to be one of the ringleaders among theyounger men. When the mills had re-opened,she had taken an uncommon interest in him.He was a faithful and industrious man, andwhen, after a few weeks of sneering at the“new-fangled notions,” he had settled intoharmony with the strange atmosphere, he hadtried to improve himself in many ways. WhenVillard took charge of the evening school,he had held aloof for a few weeks, but atlast joined one of Fales’ classes. In theirentertainments and dances, he had taken leadingparts; and that day, Villard had offeredhim the post of overseer in one of the minordepartments at the mills. It was quite a stepup for the young man, and Villard had been208surprised at his hesitation in accepting theoffer.

Salome knew all this; and as she heartilyliked the fellow, she determined to influencehim for his own interest.

O’Donovan was silent for some moments,after they started, doubtless being unaccustomedto escort ladies of her degree in that friendlyway. But Salome soon put him at his ease byher kind and easy manner.

“And so you’re going to be promoted,” shesaid, after a little. “I hope you like that?”

“Miss Shepard,” he blurted out in confusedspeech, “that’s what I want to talk about.There’s something—I mean, I want to tell—Iought to tell you something, Miss Shepard.”

“Very well. It oughtn’t to be very difficultto do that,” and her tone was cordial and encouraging.

“I don’t think I ought to take the position—unlessyou say so. But I expect you’ll putme in irons, if I tell you. Only—well, theother fellows would say I was a blasted fool—barrin’your presence, miss.”

“Why, John,” exclaimed Salome wonderingly.For the young man was in a great209state of excitement. “What can it be?Surely, you know you need not be afraid ofme?”

“You remember the night some one triedto blow up the mill—and Mr. Greenough—andMr. Villard——” Salome stood still and gazedthrough the summer moonlight at her strangeescort. He did not look up, but stood like aculprit before her.

“I don’t know how you managed to findout and save ’em,” he went on. “MissShepard—it was me.”

“It was John Ross that planned it and putme up to it. When he died, I wondered if hehadn’t told you or Mr. Villard. Ever sincethen, I’ve been trying to, but somehow Icouldn’t—tell Mr. Villard—nor you neither.—Itwas John Ross that planned it. He calledme a coward and a scab—and, finally, well—youknow I was a crazy fool then, with therest of ’em.—It ain’t no use talkin’, miss, butwe all discussed and brooded over things until210we were half out of our heads. If any one ofus had weakened first, we’d all give up, and thestrike would have bu’st; but—well, ’tain’t nouse talkin’, I s’pose. I’ve confessed, and youcan have me put in irons, if you want to.”

“Oh, miss, when I found how you saved themill that night, and the lives of those two men,I went down on my knees with thankfulness.It somehow seemed to open my eyes to whereI’d been standin’. Then, when the millsopened and you took us back, and when youcommenced to take an interest in us; whenyou built that beautiful big Hall, and allthem cottages; and, if you’ll pardon me forsayin’ it, when you begun walkin’ thro’ themills yourself, speakin’ a pleasant word to usall and smilin’ at us as if we were all yourequals, miss—and you a saint,——it was thenI seemed no better’n a murderer. And whenJohn Ross died, and the detectives gave uplookin’ for the men, it was bore in on me ashow I ought to confess; and to-day, when Mr.Villard called me into the office and praisedmy work, and said I’d been faithful and trustworthy——trustworthy,211ma’am!—why, then,I couldn’t stand it no longer.”

The young man stood silent in the moonlight.Salome’s eyes were filled with tears.

“John,” she said, “you are a noble fellow.It is no more than right that you should confessthis to me, but not all fellows in your placecould do it. You can because you have themaking of a man in you.”

“Then I want you to go to Mr. Villard to-morrowmorning and tell him you accept theplace. Then do your best, and deserve betterthings in future.”

“John,” she went on, and she seemed to himlike the pictures of saints in the church, as shestood in her white gown in the silvery light,“if your scheme had succeeded, you would notonly have destroyed most valuable property of212mine; you would have killed two of my dearestfriends; but you have turned over a newleaf. I feel sure that nothing will ever induceyou to consent to anything of the kind again.”

“Now, you have confessed like a man, Iwill forgive like a woman. You will acceptthe new place. You will go on studying andimproving yourself, and some day I shall beproud of you, and you will be proud that youonce had the manliness to come to me andconfess a crime. Now, we will bury the thingforever, and never speak of it again. Onlypromise me you will go to Mr. Villard in themorning and do as I ask you.”

“I promise,” said the young man solemnly.Then he dropped on his knees and seizing herhand, bent his head reverently upon it.

“If the God in Heaven above is like you,”he said, “He is a God worth serving.”

“My poor forgiveness resembles His, John,only as a drop of rain resembles the mightyocean.”

They walked silently home, and O’Donovanleft her with a new purpose in his heart that213has never left it since. He is to-day a thrivingChristian gentleman. Dare any one say itwould have been better to condemn him as alaw-breaker?

“Nobody but a woman, I suppose, wouldhave dealt justice so,” said Salome to herself,as she put out her light an hour later, andturned to the window—“nobody but JohnVillard.”

A year rolled by—a year of prosperity tothe Shawsheen Mills, and of growth and improvementin the condition of their operatives.John Villard had been made first superintendentand a new man had taken his place.Salome continued to act as her own agent andhad developed a keen love and tact for thebusiness,—a condition of affairs which Mrs.Soule never ceased to bemoan.

The young people at the Hall were more thanever the dearest objects of her solicitude. Inmost cases, their elevation had been steady andsubstantial. Young men had become self-respectingand carried themselves with increaseddignity. Young women gradually grew lessfrivolous and more earnest. Thrown togetherunder so much better conditions than formerly,both sexes emulated the politeness which they215were quick to notice between Villard and Salome.They became more quiet and decorous; theyread a better class of books; they began, in theirway, to cultivate higher tastes than had beenknown in the old factory boarding-house oramong the tumble-down tenement houses. Severalmarriages had taken place, at which Salomehad acted as the girl’s guardian, giving awaythe bride. Young O’Donovan’s was the first ofthese. His increased pay as overseer enabledhim to marry Kitty Kendall, to whom he hadlong been devoted; and the young bridegroomwas even happier than the bride when Salomeoffered to act in that capacity. Neither ofthem would have dared ask it of her, but herevident willingness to act on this occasion encouragedthose who came after, until Salomesaid she felt all the responsibilities of a motherwith a large family of daughters.

As Villard saw all this marrying and givingin marriage, he grew, at times, more restless.There were occasions when he came suddenlyupon Salome, or, perhaps during their raretalks together, when he felt sure for a momentthat she felt for him more than a friendlyinterest. But, remembering his comparative216poverty, he never spoke the one word whichwould have broken down all barriers. AndSalome successfully concealed her feeling forhim, not daring, even, to examine it herself.So they had drifted on, more than friends andless than lovers, through another year.

There came, at last, the first period ofabsence from each other since Mr. Greenough’sdeath. Daily association, pleasant as it is, cannotteach lovers how much they love, as can ashort separation.

The second dividend of the mills had beendeclared, each operative getting three and ahalf per cent., this time, on their wages. Whenthe work consequent on this transaction wasclosed up, it was decided to put new machineryin the lower mills. There was an improvedkind in one of the Holyoke mills, and it wasdecided that Villard should go, personally, toexamine its workings, leaving Salome and thesecond superintendent alone for a few days.

Villard had made his preparations to startwith a strange sinking at the heart. He wasnot a man to indulge in silly presentiment, buthe could not feel any enthusiasm about going.He had not taken two days away from the217mills in two years, and was justly entitled to avacation; but every time he thought of goingto Holyoke, his heart sank within him.

He thought it was because he must leaveSalome, and chided himself for his sentimentalfancies. He told himself to be a man; not asilly fool. And, finally, he refused to think ofhis premeditated journey, since he could not doso comfortably.

He was to leave Shepardtown on a seven-thirtyexpress, west. Salome remained atthe office unusually late that afternoon. Shemade him go carefully over her various duties,and recount, over and over again, everythingnecessary for her to say or do while he wasgone.

The other superintendent was called awayearly, and she was left alone with Villard in theinner office, the clerks coming in and out andMarion dropping in once on a trifling errand.

She held out her hand and Villard took it.A subtle fire shot from it straight to Villard’sheart. He looked up. Were her eyes, so soft218and kind, suffused with tears? Was this thestrong, self-reliant Salome?

“Come right in this way,” said a heartyvoice at the other door. “Villard will tell youwhat you want to know——”

“Good-bye,” said Salome again, in the mostmatter-of-fact tone, releasing her hand just intime, as the other superintendent ushered in abuyer from the west. “Good-bye and goodluck;” and turning, she walked away withthe nonchalant air which a woman knows sowell how to assume, even at the most seriousmoment of her life.

Poor Villard was both confused and exaltedby the sudden dawn of blessedness, which hadas suddenly faded. He turned to the buyerbut was incoherent, and gave wrong prices onthe last shipment of cotton, so that his customerfelt obliged to call him back to hissenses by a not over-delicate allusion to theparting he was shrewd enough to guess he hadinterrupted.

Salome went home in a strangely depressedmood. She ate but little dinner, and excusing219herself early in the evening on the plea ofunusual weariness, she retired to her room, undressedand donned a silken night-wrapper,only to lie awake all night, worrying herselfwith fruitless questioning. In the watches ofthe night and under cover of the dark, shetold herself that she had given her heart unsought;that had Villard loved her as she didhim, nothing could have kept him from sayingso; that she had been vain and conceited infancying that, under his quiet demeanor, heloved her.

Then she remembered his sudden, yearninglook when he had grasped her hand, and that,from the depths of his great, manly heart, hehad called her “Salome.” And then, woman-like,she shed a few hot tears of gratitude andimpatience.

Marion Shaw, meanwhile, had gone to theHall alone that evening. Her work amongthe mill-girls had grown dearer to her heartwith every month. Most of the girls lovedher now, and looked upon her as a comrade,though walking on much higher groundthan they. Many of them had secret aspirationsto reach the standard of her ideals, as220they dimly conceived it, and were the betterfor trying.

Marion had not had a long fight with herselfwhen weeks had rolled into months, andshe heard no word from Burnham.

She had always been an individual girl—onewho thought for herself, who set high idealsfor herself, who believed that one only doesone’s duty by living at one’s highest and noblest.

When she was a mere girl she had becomeacquainted with a young college-student, andtheir friendship ripened into love. When shebecame engaged to Ralph Leland, Marionlooked upon her betrothal as no less sacredthan a marriage vow. When, after a fewyears of study and close confinement in atheological seminary, Leland had shownsymptoms of consumption and been ordered toColorado, her mother was slowly nearing herdeath, with the same disease. It had wrungher heart with anguish to decide between them,but Leland had said:

“Stay with your mother, Marion. Shecannot live long and needs you with her to theend. I shall live many years, and, I feel confident,may yet entirely recover. It is hard,221but your mother can have but a year or twoat the most. I hope to live for many years.And we could neither of us be happy if weremembered her here, sorrowing and sufferingalone.”

And so Marion had staid to nurse her dyingmother, and Ralph Leland had gone west toseek health and strength. In two months hewas seized with congestion of the lungs anddied suddenly, away from all friends and apartfrom her.

What Marion suffered at this time, only awoman can understand. What she endured,only a woman who has gone down into theblackness of despair can conceive. Hermother failing gradually, her lover gone, whatwonder that, for a time, life seemed a blank?

After the first, she had not talked aboutRalph, but nursed his memory silently, dayand night. For eighteen months, she tooksole care of her mother, seeing her slip awayinto the “great unknown,” inch by inch.Never did the mother realize that she wasgoing to die, and she constantly made plans forthe next season when she was going to be “somuch better.” Often Marion, knowing she222was soon to be motherless, would leave her lowseat near her mother, and stand behind theinvalid’s chair to hide the tears that welledup, even while she agreed with the invalid’splans.

Day by day, the gnawing agony of seeingher mother slowly dying before her meltedinto and overshadowed the loss of that lovewhich was to have shielded and defended hertill death. But she never gave way, beforemortal eyes, to her sorrow; and she neverfailed to minister to the mother who so neededher care.

By and by she was left alone. Then, forthe first time, did the awful sense of loss overpowerher. For days she did not sleep ortake any nourishment. Then she rallied andgirded herself for the struggle for existencewhich such women must make, and which, inher case, had been eased by the door whichSalome had opened to her.

Through all her trials and discouragement,Ralph Leland had been a present reality to her.Even since the first blackness of darkness shehad believed that somewhere, somehow, shewould meet him as of old, and they would live223again for each other. Then she came tobelieve that he loved her still, wherever inGod’s great universe he might be.

“When he was in Colorado,” she used tosay to herself, “I never had a doubt that heloved me still. If he had gone to the farthestcorner of the earth I should not have dreamedof his forgetting me. Why should I now,when he has only gone to a remoter part of theuniverse?”

This thought was the one, calm, sustaininghelp to her in all her work. And in this beliefshe was strong to take up any burden whichmight be laid upon her.

When she came to Shepardtown and metBurnham, she had been struck by the subtle,strange resemblance to Ralph which she saw inhim. It was more than the mere resemblanceof feature. It was the resemblance of expression,of looks, of the intangible essence of life.

From this point on, so long as she came indaily contact with Burnham, she was fascinatedby this ever-recurring resemblance; sometimesshe was half-persuaded that it was Leland whotalked or sang to her, and she sat watching himin dreamy remembrance of the old days, before224her mother or Ralph had sickened. As she grewgradually to believe that Burnham loved her,she thanked Heaven that a good man’s love wasto brighten her life once more. When theveil was rent away, and she saw that Burnhamwas not the true, white-souled knight she hadthought him, and realized that he was not theideal she had believed and trusted in, she wassurprised to find that she no longer loved him.And then she thought out the true solution.

On the night of Villard’s departure, as hasbeen said, Marion had gone to the work shemost delighted in—her work among the girls.There were classes to be overlooked, and herown special one in singing to be taught. Shewas half through the musical hour, when sheturned suddenly towards the door. Therestood Geoffrey Burnham.

Afterwards she remembered how little feelingthe sight of him caused her. But then shesaid pleasantly:

“Oh, won’t you walk in and hear us sing?My girls have made decided improvement sinceyou heard us last,” and she went on composedlywith the class.

Burnham looked on wonderingly. As he225watched this self-possessed young woman, hisold passion flamed up within him. He hadnever cared for her as at that moment. Whenthe class was over, she advanced toward him.

“Aren’t you going to shake hands with afellow?” he said, holding out his own.

“Certainly,” she said, without the least emotion.He would have retained his hold uponher hand, but she withdrew it, saying:

“I came,” he said, “on business. I mustsee Villard. But they tell me he won’t behome for several days. There’s a certain combinationof forces we want to get him into, ifpossible.”

“You won’t, you know,” laughed Marion,“unless it’s for the good of the working-men.”

“Well, it is,” answered Burnham. “Asociety is being planned for Lowell, which willdo for the operatives there something like thatwhich Villard and Salome and you have beendoing here. I said I would come down andconsult with him to-night. Besides, I——can’tyou guess any other reason for my coming?”

“Oh, plenty of them,” replied Marion indifferently.226“I suppose you feel a friendship forall who were once your people, and rather wantto see them once more.”

“Not that, at all,” said he significantly,determined now that she should hear him out.“Are you going home? May I walk downwith you?”

Marion gave her permission and went forher wraps. She half felt what was coming,but she was strangely apathetic.

When they were out under the stars, thetalk began in commonplaces; but Burnhamsoon veered it round where he chose.

“Cold?” she repeated, purposely misunderstandinghim. “I’m not cold. This wrap Ihave on is warmer than it looks.”

“You know I love you. I—know you onceloved me,” he went on, losing his head, as aconsequence of her indifference. “Perhapsyou resented my treating you as I did. PerhapsI didn’t do right, going off that way,without a word; but I thought it better227so. You see—my mother,—and I,—MarionShaw!”—he seized her hand, grasping it inboth his own—“will you marry me?”

It was cool, and she felt like a spectator atstage theatricals which did not concern her.

“Marion, you did love me, you can’t denyit!” he said. “What is the trouble?”

“I’m sorry you have brought this subject upto-night,” she said, gently. “It had muchbetter have remained dead and buried.”

“Marion Shaw, you shall not evade me so,”retorted Burnham, led on by her steady refusalto respond to his passion. “You did love me—Iwas sure of it—or else, you are the basestof coquettes, and were playing with me. Andnow you are tired of me!”

“As you were of me!” she blazed out, nowroused into speech. “Listen, since you dareaddress me as you do. I did not love you.You thought I did. I thought I did. Whenyou found it convenient for some reason, Ineither know nor care what, to leave me withouta word, I found, for the first time, that Iwas only in love withbeing in love. No,—waituntil I am through. Ten years ago I became228engaged to the bravest and best and truest manthat ever lived.” Marion’s voice broke, but shewent on. “He died and I kept on loving hismemory, loving him wherever he might be.When I met you, the striking resemblance youbore to him smote me like an electric shock.You seemed good and noble like him, andunder the glamour of your constant presenceand evident fancy for me, I allowed myself todrift into a sentimental feeling for you. I nowsee what that feeling was. It was only a loveof being in love; and you happened to be theone man I have met so far, and I hope theonly one I shall ever meet, capable of callingthat feeling out. You have compelled me tospeak plainly. I hope you are satisfied. Thisis our gate. Miss Shepard has retired, but shewill be glad to see you at the office in themorning. Good-night.” And Marion lefthim standing rooted to the ground where sheleft him.

For a few days Burnham felt himself a badlyused man. He had loved and his love hadbeen trampled on, he said to himself.

He went back to Lowell the next day, promisingto write Villard; and a week after, when he229had settled down at home again with his daintyand querulous mother, he went calmly over theground of his defeat.

“She never did a more sensible thing in herlife,” he declared, as he lighted his pipe, atlast. “It would have been an awful bore tohave to live up to her ideal.”

Three days passed at the mills with nospecial incident. To Salome they seemed thedullest she had ever known. For the first time,she discovered that the Shawsheen Mills andthe condition of its operatives was not enoughto satisfy the inmost longings of her heart, orto still its disquietude. Without the presenceof John Villard, and the constant inspirationof his presence, life lost its zest and sparkle.

When the three days were over, Salome wentto her pillow at night with a sense of relief.Until now, she had not realized what her positionat the head of the mills might mean withoutVillard. She saw that without him shecould have done little, and would have mademany mistakes—a fact which it was good forher to realize. And then she remembered,with sudden terror, that he might leave her atany moment, as Burnham had done.

231“He will be home in the morning,” she saidto her disquieted heart, “and I will offer hima share in the business. I will make him apartner, and then I shall never lose him.”And even in the darkness of night and theprivacy of her own room, she resolutely putaway from herself any other contingency.

The morning dawned beautiful, fresh andbalmy, as only a spring morning late in Maycan dawn in New England. Salome dressedherself with unusual care. A strange, happyfeeling under-ran all her thoughts. She wouldnot think of him; she would not look forwardto his coming; but, for her, all the gladness ofthe May morning, all the blossoming of springflowers, all the caroling of joyous birds, meantonly that Villard had arrived in Shepardtownon the night express, and that she would see himin an hour or two. She did not hurry herpreparations for breakfast,—this was such astrange, delightful mood. She looked at herown reflection in the mirror, thinking unconsciouslyof making herself fair for him. Shesang snatches of merry song from the lastcomic opera, laughing to herself as she recalledhow her nurse used to forbid her singing before232the morning meal, and how she used to repeat,in a lugubrious tone, the old sign:

And, still singing, she stopped at her aunt’sroom, only to find that everybody had gonedownstairs before her.

Mrs. Soule and Marion were chatting pleasantlyover their hot-house grapes when sheentered the breakfast-room. The morningpapers lay untouched beside Salome’s plate.She took her place and leisurely pared anorange. Afterwards she remembered the timeshe wasted in cutting the peel into fantasticshapes.

“Has nobody looked at the papers?” sheasked, after a while. “I declare, how self-absorbedwe are growing. Who knows butthe world has, half of it, come to an end, overnight?”

She picked up one of the papers—the onewhich contained the most startling head-lines,the most sickening sensations. Opening it, hereyes became riveted to the front page. Herface paled. She grew whiter, but no one233noticed. When Marion looked up, the paper wasfalling from Salome’s hand, and she had fallenback in her chair—faint, speechless with terror.

With a cry, Marion sprang to her side; butSalome, by a tremendous effort, recovered herself.

Running her eye hastily down the column,Marion gathered that the night express hadbeen crashed into by a heavy freight; thatboth trains had been thrown off the track;that many passengers had been killed, scalded,mangled or bruised.

She looked quickly over the list of killed.There were no familiar names; but at the headof the wounded was:

“Help me to get ready,” she said. “I mustgo to him immediately.” Marion marveled tosee her so calm; but she knew only too well theanguish concealed in the woman’s heart below.

“What is it? What are you going to do?Why does not some one tell me?” asked Mrs.Soule.

“Dear auntie,” and Salome bent and kissedthe fair, soft cheek, “there has been a terribleaccident to the train that Mr. Villard wascoming home on. I am going to him. He isdying.” Then she left the room.

In less than an hour she was at the railwaystation, waiting for the train to Boston. Atthe last moment, Mrs. Soule, having recoveredfrom the shock which the news had given her,had tried to dissuade her niece from going.

It seemed to her that this was the strangestthing her unaccountable niece had ever done.She really must remonstrate with her on theimpropriety of her conduct. And seeing thatSalome would not be restrained from making235this erratic trip, she proposed to go, too, aschaperon. Only Salome must wait for thenoon train, as she could not possibly get readyfor an earlier one.

“The noon train!” exclaimed Salome, buttoningher gloves. “No, auntie, Mr. Villardmay not live until then. I shall go to him atonce. You forget that I am no longer a younggirl. I am a business woman, and my chiefassistant lies dying.” She bent over and kissedher aunt, who was still remonstrating, and randown the steps to the waiting carriage, whereMarion had already taken her seat.

And when the train finally drew out ofShepardtown, and she had left her friend standingon the platform, she gave an involuntarysigh. Only the strong heart, which can bestbear its grief alone, will understand her feeling.

The train had never seemed so slow to her.Strained and anxious with that nervous intensitywhich makes a woman waste her strengthin a half-conscious physical effort to propel, by236her own will-power, the great, unsympathetic,methodical engine, she sat straight up in herseat with heart and soul benumbed. Constantlybefore her, was the picture of John Villard—mangled,bleeding, dying—perhaps dead.Her brain reeled as she thought of him lyingpale and cold in death.

She remembered how, only three days ago,he had clasped her hand and looked into hereyes; how he had called her “Salome,” hisvoice deep and tender with emotion. Dead?No, it could not be. And still the long, unfeelingtrain stopped to take on its horde ofpassengers, or to let off a working-man or aschool-girl.

The hour’s ride to Boston seemed to her aneternity; and when, at last, they rolled into thelong, covered shed, Salome was first to reachthe steps, and first to touch the platform.

Ordering a carriage, she was soon on her wayacross the city. But here again the slownessof her progress drove her nearly frantic. Shecalled to the driver and told him she woulddouble his fee if he caught the next train forthe scene of the accident. He did not knowwhat time that would be, but he accepted the237offer and drove at such a rate of speed that anagent of the Humane Society ran after him tocatch his number,—and did not succeed.

When they reached the Albany station,Salome threw him the smallest bill she had, atwo-dollar one,—and without waiting for thechange, hastened to the ticket-office. It wasbeset with more than the usual crowd of curiousquestioners and eager passengers, whose plansthe accident had thrown into confusion. Itwas some minutes before Salome could reachthe window. She was about to turn away indespair when the agent recognized her.

“Let that lady pass, there,” he said, authoritatively;and then Salome learned that arelief train had been sent early in the morning,that another would be starting in ten minutes,and that regular trains would be run in thecourse of an hour or two, “carrying by,” atJones’s Crossing, where the accident hadoccurred.

“They are still living,” answered the agent.“But some of them are so badly hurt theymust die. Stand back there, one minute,” he238said to the crowd. “Well, I don’t know, miss,whether you could go on the relief train. Youmight go out and ask, though they’ve shutdown on the crowd.”

Salome turned away. For the first time sincebreakfast a clear thought came into her brain.She went out to the train-gate.

No, they could not take any one. Therewere so many wanting to go, and they onlytook one car. Oh, a friend of the injured?Well, she must go to the division superintendent,or the general passenger agent. Therewas the “G. P. A.” over there.

Salome walked over to the official designated,—apleasant gentleman with kind eyes.

“I am Miss Shepard of Shepardtown,” shesaid; “my chief superintendent is among the injured,and is probably dying. He has no friends,and I must get to him. Can you help me?”

The official took out a little book, wrote hername on a blank pass, and handed it to her.

“Anything we can do for him or for you,Miss Shepard, we shall be glad to do. Youneedn’t hesitate to ask. Your grandfatherwas once kind to me, when I was a poor boy.”

The passenger agent hurried away to the239engine, giving some last orders, and Salomedid not have a chance to thank him.

“You’ll have to hurry, miss,” a brakeman saidwho was standing near. “The train is going.”

This train had the right of way and a cleartrack for some distance. They seemed to fly,as they sped out through the suburbs into thecountry beyond.

The bloom of the May morning was still onthe tender, up-springing grass and the freshfoliage of the trees. Birds sang cheerfully on,in spite of the thundering engine on its way tothe scene of woe. But there was no morebeauty in the world for Salome.

Three or four physicians sat in the cornerof the one baggage-car which they all occupiedtogether, and, used as they were to scenes ofdeath and suffering, talked indifferently ofpolitics and the misdoings of Congress. Thebrakeman laughed as the conductor passedhim with some trivial remark. To Salome itseemed that she alone, of all the world, caredbecause thirteen persons lay dead and twentymore were fatally injured, a few miles away.

240Afterwards, when she saw the tendernessand courageous sympathy of these peopleamong the suffering, she reversed her judgment.

A small woman in black sat at the oppositeend of the car, and was the only other passenger.

“Who is that?” She stopped the conductorto ask the question, at last drawn out of herown sorrow by the pathetic attitude of thewoman’s figure.

“That’s the engineer’s mother. He isfatally hurt. He’s the last of her five boys,and her sole dependence. It’s pretty rough onher; but the boys won’t let her suffer.”

His words came like a reproach to her.What right had she, with all her wealth andfriends and pleasures, to think of herself as theonly suffering one? What was her sorrow,compared to that of this bereaved mother?

She felt an impulse to go over to the motionlessfigure and speak a word of comfort. Andthen she felt the train slacking up.

When the train stopped, two of the physicians,having heard who she was, came forward with241offers of assistance. The others were kindlyaiding the pathetic old lady in black.

And then Salome found herself face to facewith such a scene as she had never even dreamedof.

The public is, through the “enterprising”journalistic system of the present day, alreadytoo familiar with such scenes of sickening horror.To Salome, this one came as the vivid realizationof things she had hitherto carefully avoidedin the newspapers.

At first, she turned faint and sick at theprospect. Several dead bodies lay plainly insight, partially covered with a blanket. Theliving must first be cared for; and groans onevery side, from those who, even yet, hadnot been extricated from the debris, told howmuch still remained to be done.

“Tell me,” she said, catching at the arm of adoctor who had been on the ground since daybreak,“where is Mr. Villard?”

“Villard? Let’s see—tall man? Darkhair and full beard? Yes. He was removedto the tavern over there an hour ago.” Andhe passed on to another sufferer.

Salome looked across the railroad track, in242the direction the physician had pointed. Therewas a country store, a “tavern,” and three orfour less pretentious buildings.

Hastily she clambered over the torn-up track,down the embankment and across the narrow,open field. There were no signs of life aroundthe group of houses. Everybody was at thescene of the accident.

She walked into the tavern. It seemed to bedeserted. Through the narrow hall she couldsee, at the end of the building, a dining-room;at one side was the office, where no one was inview. The clerk heard her step, however, andcame hastily from the dining-room.

“Is there a Mr. Villard here?” she began—“apatient, from the accident?”

“There are three men upstairs who werehurt,” the clerk answered. “There’s no onehere to tend office, or I’d show you up.”

“I must find him. Is there no one to showme the way?” she asked, impatient at thislast trivial delay.

“They’re each in different rooms up there,”was the reply. “Walk right up the stairs.There’s nurses up there. They’ll tell you.”

Salome turned up the narrow, dingy staircase.243At the top there was no one in sight.Groans came from behind a closed door. Inside,she could hear voices, subdued to anundertone. In the absolute silence, she heardthe word “amputation.” Could this be Villard’sroom?

She leaned against the wall, unable to trythat latch. While she stood there, helpless anddazed, she lifted her eyes to the opposite doorway.It was open.

Inside, there seemed to be no one. Certainlythere was no attendant. She stepped forwardand looked in. There, on the white, clean bed,lay the form of John Villard, his face whiterthan the pillow it rested against, his dark haircontrasting strangely with his paleness.

With the sight, all the repressed love of thelast two years swept over Salome like a resistlessimpulse. A hand seemed clutching at herheart. Her limbs seemed paralyzed; but in aninstant she was beside the bed, looking downat the closed eyes. A terrible fear that he wasdead swept over her. With an inarticulategroan, she knelt beside him and laid her handagainst his face.

He opened his eyes and smiled faintly. Hethought he had died and reached Heaven.

Villard’s convalescence was slow and tedious.When Salome had found him, his dislocatedshoulder had been restored to place, and hisbroken ankle set. Then, as there were notnurses enough for the great need, he had beenleft alone.

What passed in that first ten minutes afterSalome had found him is still a sacredmemory between them. At last, she said, lookingat him through wet eyes, “You must havea nurse.”

“Oh, Salome, do not leave me,” he answered;and his voice, weakened from hisinjuries and tender with the passion which, atlast, he had not been afraid to declare, waslike music to her heart.

She bent her blushing face upon the pillowbeside him. “May I stay and take care ofyou?” she asked, softly.

“Then we must be married to-day.” Salomehad waited a little for him to say it; but, manlike,he had not been thinking of the proprieties.

“I cannot leave you to hired nurses now,”she murmured. “So, there is only this oneway out of it.”

And so they were married, that brightMay morning, amid scenes of anguish, andwhile Villard still hovered near the gates ofdeath. And for weeks they remained at“Jones’s Tavern,” he ill, wretched, racked withpain; she, bearing the trials and discomforts ofthe place, vigils of long night-watches, the dull,dragging anxiety; and yet, there was never ahappier or more blessed honeymoon.

When he was able to be moved on astretcher, he was taken to Shepardtown. Theirhome-coming was a glad one, although it wasnecessarily quiet. Every operative in the millshad been at the station, when the train thatbore the two who had done so much for them246came steaming in. Salome nodded to many ofthem, with moist but happy eyes. But thefamily physician, who had met them in Boston,would allow of no hand-shaking.

“Time enough for that by and by,” hetold the men who stood foremost in the crowd.“Do you want to kill him?”

He could not prevent several of the strongestones from stepping forward, however, andtaking the stretcher in their own hands, and bearingVillard very gently to the waiting carriage.

“I never thought to enter this house so,”Villard whispered to Salome, when he wascarefully borne up the stairs in the Shepardmansion and placed tenderly in bed.

“Thank Heaven, you were permitted tocome, evenso,” she replied, with a shudder.He had been so near Death’s door, instead!

“I can’t and won’t say I approve of whatyou’ve done,” said Mrs. Soule that night. “Ifyou must marry him at all, I could not see whyyou should want to do it then and there. Youmight have waited, I think, and had such awedding as befits a daughter of the Bourdillons.Besides, all this watching and care haspulled you down. You look pale and worn.247You’ll lose your beauty before you are thirty-five.”

“I suppose, at least, you’ll give a receptionwhen he gets well enough. You really owe itto society and your own position. All yourfather’s, your mother’s, and your own friendswill expect it. You have planned for that, Isuppose? Since you had no wedding gown, youought to give Redferncarte blanche for yourreception gown. Have you written them?”

“Auntie,” said Salome, “John and I havebeen, in these past weeks, where we did notthink of party gowns.”

“No, I suppose there was not much atJones’s Crossing to remind you of them. Butnow, you certainly are thinking of onenow?”

Salome sighed. There was really no use inexpecting her little, exquisite, cameo-cut auntto understand her.

“I suppose we may give some sort of reception.All my people are waiting anxiously tosee John,” she said.

“Factory-people!” exclaimed Mrs. Souleindignantly; but her niece had moved away.

248It was several weeks later, when Villard wasfirst able to come downstairs. As soon aspossible for him to bear the excitement, theoperatives were invited to the house one evening,and permitted to shake hands with the manwhom they had always considered their friend,and to whom they had now become closely endeared.The marriage between him andSalome had, somehow, seemed to draw himcloser to them. They were now his people aswell as hers.

“This isn’t going to take you away from usat the Hall?” said one of the young men duringthe evening. “Mr. Fales and Mr. Welmanare good—but they are not you.”

“I shall be there every evening,” was Villard’sreply. “I am much more anxious notto lose you than you can be not to lose me.”

When they had all gone away, and Marionhad sent them both upstairs for the night,Salome drew her husband down to her favoriteseat in a cosy bay-window, where the Augustmoon was streaming in through vines and foliage,making a checkered radiance around them.

“Can’t you see? I’m going to retire. Youare now the head of the Shawsheen Mills.”

Villard said nothing. In spite of the greatlove between them, he could not forget thatshe was wealthy nor that he was poor.

“I have to-day made over the entire mill propertyto you,” she went on. “I am notgoing to have it said that your wife has all themoney and all the power, and that you areonly her dependent.”

“Salome! you dear, generous heart,” saidVillard brokenly; “I cannot accept.” Hefelt that she had divined his sensitiveness,although she had been too delicate to speak ofit. “I am poor, but I am not a beggar.”

“And I, too, am proud,” she replied, layingher hand on his cheek. “I will not havepeople saying that you are tied to a rich wifeand are subject to her whims. Oh, I know250how they talk; I have seen and heard themall my life! Why, they would say you werea fortune-hunter.”

“Confess, dear,” she answered him. “If ithad not been for that, wouldn’t you havespoken long ago?”

“I came very near it, as it was,” he said,presently. “But I could not bear to bethought that.”

“I had the necessary papers made out thisafternoon,” she said after an eloquent silence,“when I was out. So you see the thing isdone whether you will or not. You need haveno hesitation. I still have a large fortune left,you know, from the Bourdillons.”

“If it were anybody else in the world butmy noble, generous wife,” he began, “I wouldrefuse, even now.”

“If it were any one else but my noblehusband,” she replied, “I could not yieldcontrol of the mills, and all the plans I havecherished for the employes. But I know inwhom I trust,” and her eyes shone with wifelypride and affection.

251“There are still so many things to do,” saidVillard, a little later. “I know I can alwaysdepend on you to help me.”

“Oh, I am not laying down the work andretiring to the old life of idleness,” was thereply. “I shall leave the management of themills to their new owner. It’s no part of amarried woman’s business to manage her husband’soffice. But I shall have all the moreleisure left for doing good. I have no end ofschemes to lay before you; and, I have nodoubt, you have wiser plans than mine.”

“I am glad, on the whole,” said Villardthoughtfully, “that you are going to have morefreedom. You are tired and worn with watchingand caring for me,—dear, blessed soul thatyou are. Your burdens, in the past two years,have been borne marvelously well. Any otherwoman would have given way long ago. But,after all, I am a selfish man.”

“All I have and all I am, dear, is yours.And yet, I cannot help feeling that we havestill a great work to do. Employers, on all252sides, are looking to see us fail in our attempts.As we stand or fall, will factories outside ofShepardtown be benefited or injured.”

“I remember what you once said, Salome.Your brave words were a watchword with memany a time when my courage was low.”

“‘We want to show the world that thespirit of Him crucified may rule in a cotton-millas fully as in the life of a saint.’ My darling,nobody but you would have had the courageto say that. We will take the sentiment as ourrule of life.”

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The Project Gutenberg eBook ofSalome Shepard, reformer

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