but we are powerless."

"My enthusiasm has been aroused, of late, on the subject," Alice
went on, "by the talks and preaching of my old friend, Mr. Watts."

Travis frowned: "The old Bishop of Cottontown," he added
ironically--"and he had better stop it--he will get into trouble
yet."

"Why?"

"Because he is doing the mill harm."

"And I don't suppose one should do a corporation harm," she said
quickly,--"even to do humanity good?"

"Oh, Alice, let us drop so disagreeable a subject," said her mother.
"Come, Richard and I want some music."

"Any way," said Alice, rising, "I do very much hope you will bring
the subject up in your visit to the directors. It has grown on me
under the talks of the old Bishop and what I have seen myself--it has
become a nightmare to me."

"I don't think it is any of our business at all," spoke up Mrs.
Westmore quickly.

Alice turned her big, earnest eyes and beautiful face on her mother.

"Do you remember when I was six years old?" she asked.

"Of course I do."

"Suppose--suppose--that our poverty had come to us then, and you and
papa had died and left brother and me alone and friendless. Then
suppose we had been put into that mill to work fourteen hours a
day--we--your own little ones--brother and I"--

Mrs. Westmore sprang up with a little shriek and put her hands over
her daughter's mouth.

Richard Travis shrugged his shoulders: "I had not thought of it that
way myself," he said. "That goes home to one."

Richard Travis was always uplifted in the presence of Alice. It was
wonderful to him what a difference in his feelings, his behavior, his
ideas, her simple presence exerted. As he looked at her he thought of
last night's debauch--the bar-room--the baseness and vileness of it
all. He thought of his many amours. He saw the purity and grandeur of
her in this contrast--all her queenliness and beauty and simplicity.
He even thought of Maggie and said to himself: "Suppose Alice should
know all this.... My God! I would have no more chance of winning her
than of plucking a star from the sky!"

He thought of Helen and it made him serious. Helen's was a different
problem from Maggie's. Maggie was a mill girl--poor, with a
bed-ridden father. She was nameless. But Helen--she was of the same
blood and caste of this beautiful woman before him, whom he fully
expected to make his wife. There was danger in Helen--he must act
boldly, but decisively--he must take her away with him--out