lls periodically. They think they assert their authority that way.
But Mr. Sinclair has always seemed so liberal and broad-minded."

"You never can tell what crotchet an old bachelor will take into his
head," said Alethea Craig bitingly.

The others nodded agreement. Mr. Sinclair's inveterate celibacy was a
standing grievance with the Putney women.

"If he had a wife who could be our president this would never have
happened, I warrant you," said Mrs. King sagely.

"But what are we going to do, ladies?" said Mrs. Robbins briskly. Mrs.
Robbins was the president. She was a big, bustling woman with clear
blue eyes and crisp, incisive ways. Hitherto she had held her peace.
"They must talk themselves out before they can get down to business,"
she had reflected sagely. But she thought the time had now come to
speak.

"You know," she went on, "we can talk and rage against the men all day
if we like. They are not trying to prevent us. But that will do no
good. Here's Mrs. Cotterell invited, and all the neighbouring
auxiliaries notified--and the men won't let us have the church. The
point is, how are we going to get out of the scrape?"

A helpless silence descended upon the classroom. The eyes of every
woman present turned to Myra Wilson. Everyone could talk, but when it
came to action they had a fashion of turning to Myra.

She had a reputation for cleverness and originality. She never talked
much. So far today she had not said a word. She was sitting on the
sill of the window across from Lucy Knox. She swung her hat on her
knee, and loose, moist rings of dark hair curled around her dark,
alert face. There was a sparkle in her grey eyes that boded ill to the
men who were peaceably pursuing their avocations, rashly indifferent
to what the women might be saying in the maple-shaded classroom.

"Have you any suggestion to make, Miss Wilson?" said Mrs. Robbins,
with a return to her official voice and manner.

Myra put her long, slender index finger to her chin.

"I think," she said decidedly, "that we must strike."

* * * * *

When Elder Knox went in to tea that evening he glanced somewhat
apprehensively at his wife. They had had an altercation before she
went to the meeting, and he supposed she had talked herself into
another rage while there. But Mrs. Knox was placid and smiling. She
had made his favourite soda biscuits for him and inquired amiably
after his progress in hoeing turnips in