least, her society
had been preferred above that of a Canning. Such was the odd little
development. Carlisle, having been more with Henrietta in the past five
weeks than she had commonly been in a year, had discovered her as
undoubtedly a person you could talk things over with--the only person in
the world, perhaps, that you could talk _this_ over with....

Possibly Hen, being a lynx-eyed Cooney, had somehow gathered that her
lovely cousin had not dropped in merely to "inquire"; for when she
returned to the parlor, having doubtless put her hot-water bottle where
it would do the most good, she did not expend much time on reporting
upon her invalids, or become involved in the minor doings of the day.
Very soon she deflected, saying:

"But you don't look particularly fit yourself, Cally. What's wrong with
the world?"

Cally, being still uncertain how far she cared to confide in Hen, met
the direct question with a tentative lightness.

"Oh!... Well, I _did_ just have a rather unpleasant experience, though I
didn't know I showed it in my face!... We happened to look in at the
Works for a few minutes--Mr. Canning and I--and I certainly didn't
_enjoy_ it much ..." And then, the inner pressure overcoming her natural
bent toward reserve, she spoke with a little burst: "Oh, Hen, it was the
most horrible place I ever saw in my life!"

The little confidence spoke straight to the heart, as a touch of genuine
feeling always will. Quite unconsciously, Henrietta took her cousin's
hand, saying, "You poor dear ..." And within a minute or two Cally was
eagerly pouring out all that she had seen in the bunching-room, with at
least a part of how it had made her feel.

Hen listened sympathetically, and spoke reassuringly. If her "arguments"
followed close in the footsteps of Hugo,--for Hen was surprisingly
well-informed in unexpected ways,--it must have been some quality in
her, something or other in her underlying "attitude," that invested her
words with a new horsepower of solace. And Saltman's best stenographer
actually produced an argument that Hugo had altogether passed by. She
thought it worth while to point out that these things were not a
question of abstract morals at all, but only of changing points
of view....

"When Uncle Thornton learned business," declared Hen, "there wasn't a
labor law in the country--no law but supply and demand--pay your
work-people as little as you could, and squeeze them all they'd stand
for. Nobod