A chorus of masculine laughter attested approval to this sentiment and Mr. Strauss sat down abashed.

“Well, now, if you all understand it,” said Mary, “I want twenty-five families who will volunteer to try this four-hour-a-day arrangement—­so we can see how it works.  All those who would like to try it—­will they please stand up?”

Presently one of the labour leaders turned to Mary with a beaming eye.

“Looks as though they’ll have to draw lots,” said he...  “They are all standing up...!”

CHAPTER XXXIV

The afternoon was well advanced when her callers left, and Mary had to make up her work as best she could.

A violent thunder-storm had arisen, but in spite of the lightning she telephoned Helen.

Wally was still improving.

“I’ll be over as soon as I’ve had dinner,” said Mary, “but don’t expect me early.”

She was hanging up the receiver when the senior accountant entered, a little more detached, a little more impersonal than she had ever seen him.

“We shall have our final report ready in the morning,” he said.

“That’s good,” said Mary, starting to sign her letters.  “I’ll be glad to see it any time.”

At the door he turned, one hand on the knob.

“I haven’t seen Mr. Woodward, Jr., today.  Do you expect him tomorrow?”

At any other time she would have asked herself, “Why is he inquiring for Burdon?”—­but she had so much work waiting on her desk, demanding her attention, that it might be said she was talking subconsciously, hardly knowing what was asked or answered.

It was dusk when she was through, and the rain had stopped for a time.  Near the entrance to the house on the hill—­a turn where she always had to drive slowly—­a shabby man was standing—­a bearded man with rounded shoulders and tired eyes.

“I wonder who he is?” thought Mary.  “That’s twice I’ve seen him standing there....”

Without seeming to do so, a pretence which only a woman can accomplish, she looked at him again.  “How he stares!” she breathed.

As you have guessed, the waiting man was Paul.

For the first time that morning he had heard about the strike—­had heard other things, too—­in the cheap hotel where he had spent the night—­obscure but alarming rumours which had led him to change his plans about an immediate return to his ship.  A bit here, a bit there, he had pieced the story of the strike together—­a story which spared no names, and would have made Burdon Woodward’s ears burn many a time if he had heard it.

“There’s a bunch of Bolshevikis come in now—­” this was one of the things which Paul had been told. “‘Down with the capitalists who prey on women!’ That’s them!  But it hasn’t caught on.  Sounds sort of flat around here to those who know the women.  So this bunch of Bols has been laying low the last few days.  They’ve hired a boat and go fishing in the lake.  They don’t fool me, though—­not much they don’t.  They’re up to some deviltry, you can bet your sweet life, and we’ll be hearing about it before long—­”