“Lise, why don’t you say something to your sister?  Ain’t you glad she’s got the place?”

“Sure, I’m glad,” said Lise, and began to unscrew the top of the salt shaker.  “I don’t see why I couldn’t get a raise, too.  I work just as hard as she does.”

Edward, who had never got a “raise” in his life, was smitten with compunction and sympathy.

“Give ’em time, Lise,” he said consolingly.  “You ain’t so old as Janet.”

“Time!” she cried, flaring up and suddenly losing her control.  “I’ve got a picture of Waiters giving me a raise I know the girls that get raises from him.”

“You ought to be ashamed of yourself,” Hannah declared.  “There—­you’ve spilled the salt!”

But Lise, suddenly bursting into tears, got up and left the room.  Edward picked up the Banner and pretended to read it, while Janet collected the salt and put it back into the shaker.  Hannah, gathering up the rest of the dishes, disappeared into the kitchen, but presently returned, as though she had forgotten something.

“Hadn’t you better go after her?” she said to Janet.

“I’m afraid it won’t be any use.  She’s got sort of queer, lately—­she thinks they’re down on her.”

“I’m sorry I spoke so sharp.  But then—­” Hannah shook her head, and her sentence remained unfinished.

Janet sought her sister, but returned after a brief interval, with the news that Lise had gone out.

One of the delights of friendship, as is well known, is the exchange of confidences of joy or sorrow, but there was, in Janet’s promotion, something intensely personal to increase her natural reserve.  Her feelings toward Ditmar were so mingled as to defy analysis, and several days went by before she could bring herself to inform Eda Rawle of the new business relationship in which she stood to the agent of the Chippering Mill.  The sky was still bright as they walked out Warren Street after supper, Eda bewailing the trials of the day just ended:  Mr. Frye, the cashier of the bank, had had one of his cantankerous fits, had found fault with her punctuation, nothing she had done had pleased him.  But presently, when they had come to what the Banner called the “residential district,” she was cheered by the sight of the green lawns, the flowerbeds and shrubbery, the mansions of those inhabitants of Hampton unfamiliar with boardinghouses and tenements.  Before one of these she paused, retaining Janet by the arm, exclaiming wistfully: 

“Wouldn’t you like to live there?  That belongs to your boss.”

Janet, who had been dreaming as she gazed at the facade of rough stucco that once had sufficed to fill the ambitions of the late Mrs. Ditmar, recognized it as soon as Eda spoke, and dragged her friend hastily, almost roughly along the sidewalk until they had reached the end of the block.  Janet was red.

“What’s the matter?” demanded Eda, as soon as she had recovered from her surprise.