h, Annie Kinzer told me. Say, I wouldn't tell her anything about my
affairs. She's an awful clack."

We were silent for a moment, while I wondered if Henrietta, if Annie
Kinzer, if any girl in all the world could ever guess how lonely I had
been every moment since I had come to this great city to work and to
live. Then came the unexpected.

"Wouldn't you like to come and room with me?"

"With you?" I was half pleased, half doubtful.

"Yes. I've got plenty of room."

"Perhaps I couldn't afford it."

"Yes, you can. I don't put on style. It won't cost us more than a dollar
and a half a week for each--rent, eating, and everything else. I was
thinking, as you're a learner, it will be a long time before you can
make much, and you'd be glad to go halvers with somebody. Two can always
live cheaper than one."

A dollar and a half a week! That was indeed cheaper than I had been
living. I had something less than two dollars in my purse, and pay-day,
for me, was still a week off.

And so I accepted the proposition, and by lunch-time the news was all
over the factory that the new girl was to be Henrietta's room-mate.
Annie Kinzer--everybody, in fact--approved, except, possibly, Emma. Emma
was a homely, plainly dressed girl who had worked ten years here at
Springer's. She bore the reputation of being a prudey and a kill-joy.
Thus far she had never deigned to look at me, but now she took occasion
to pass the time of day when we met at the water-faucet, and asked, in a
doubtful tone, how long I had known Henrietta Manners.

Meanwhile we "cornered" and "tissued" and "laced" and "labeled." Higher
and higher grew our pasteboard castle, which we built as children pile
up brightly colored blocks. At eleven Henrietta sent me below for
trimmings.

"How do you like your job?" asked the young fellow who filled my order.
This was strictly conventional, and I responded in kind. While Charlie
cut tapes and counted labels, he made the most of his opportunity to
chat. Dismissing, with brief comment, the weather and the peculiar
advantages and disadvantages of box-making as a trade, he diplomatically
steered the talk along personal and social lines by suggesting, with a
suppressed sigh, the probability that I should not always be a
box-maker. I replied heartily that I hoped not, which precipitated
another question: "Is the day set yet?" My amused negative to the query,
and intimation that I had no "steady," were gratefully received, and