t then the girl was so provocative. And somehow the sight
of the girl delivered him from an excessive fear of consequences. He
said to himself, "I'll do something or I'll say something, before I
leave her to-night, just to show her!" He screwed up his resolution to
the point of registering a private oath that he would indeed do or say
something. Without a solemn oath he could not rely upon his valour. He
knew that whatever he said or did in the nature of a bold advance would
be accomplished clumsily. He knew that it would be unpleasant. He knew
that inaction suited much better his instinct for tranquillity. No
matter! All that was naught. She had challenged, and he had to
respond. Besides, she allured... And, after her scene with him in the
porch of the new house, had he not the right? ... A girl who had
behaved as she did that night cannot effectively contradict herself!

"I was just reading about this strike," she said, rustling the
newspaper.

"You've soon got into local politics."

"Well," she said, "I saw a lot of the men as we were driving from the
station. I should think I saw two thousand of them. So of course I was
interested. I made Mr Orgreave tell me all about it. Will they win?"

"It depends on the weather." He smiled.

She remained silent, and grave. "I see!" she said, leaning her chin on
her hand. At her tone he ceased smiling. She said "I see," and she
actually had seen.

"You see," he repeated. "If it was June instead of November! But then
it isn't June. Wages are settled every year in November. So if there
is to be a strike it can only begin in November."

"But didn't the men ask for the time of year to be changed?"

"Yes," he said. "But you don't suppose the masters were going to agree
to that, do you?" He sneered masculinely.

"Why not?"

"Because it gives them such a pull."

"What a shame!" Hilda exclaimed passionately. "And what a shame it is
that the masters want to make the wages depend on selling prices! Can't
they see that selling prices ought to depend on wages?"

Edwin said nothing. She had knocked suddenly out of his head all ideas
of flirting, and he was trying to reassemble them.

"I suppose you're like all the rest?" she questioned gloomily.

"How like all the rest?"

"Against the men. Mr Orgreave is, and he says your father is very
strongly against them."

"Look here," said Edwin, with an air of resentment as to which he
himself could n