for the next night
by the officers of the Marble Workers' Association.

XIV

On the third morning after Torrini's expulsion from the yard, Mr.
Slocum walked into the studio with a printed slip in his hand. A
similar slip lay crumpled under a work-bench, where Richard had
tossed it. Mr. Slocum's kindly visage was full of trouble and
perplexity as he raised his eyes from the paper, which he had been
re-reading on the way up-stairs.

"Look at that!"

"Yes," remarked Richard, "I have been honored with one of those
documents."

"What does it mean?"

"It means business."

The paper in question contained a series of resolutions
unanimously adopted at a meeting of the Marble Workers' Association
of Stillwater, held in Grimsey's Hall the previous night. Dropping
the preamble, these resolutions, which were neatly printed with a
type-writing machine on a half letter sheet, ran as follows:--

_Resolved,_ That on and after the First of June proximo, the
pay of carvers in Slocum's Marble Yard shall be $2.75 per day,
instead of $2.50 as heretofore.

_Resolved,_ That on and after the same date, the rubbers and
polishers shall have $2.00 per day, instead of $1.75 as heretofore.

_Resolved,_ That on and after the same date the millmen are
to have $2.00 per day, instead of $1.75 as heretofore.

_Resolved,_ That during the months of June, July, and August
the shops shall knock off work on Saturdays at five P.M., instead of
at six P.M.

_Resolved,_ That a printed copy of these Resolutions be laid
before the Proprietor of Slocum's Marble Yard, and that his immediate
attention to them be respectfully requested. _Per order of
Committee M. W. A._

"Torrini is at the bottom of that," said Mr. Slocum.

"I hardly think so. This arrangement, as I told you the other day
before I had the trouble with him, has been in contemplation several
weeks. Undoubtedly Torrini used his influence to hasten the movement
already planned. The Association has too much shrewdness to espouse
the quarrel of an individual."

"What are we to do?"

"If you are in the same mind you were when we talked over the
possibility of an unreasonable demand like this, there is only one
thing to do."

"Fight it?"

"Fight it."

"I have been resolute, and all that sort of thing, in times past,"
observed Mr. Slocum, glancing out of the tail of his eye at Richard,
"and have always come off second best. The Association has drawn up
most of my rules fo