start for his
uniform and his Safety First button. But we couldn't do much because we
didn't have time. You see this is our birthday, and we had to go for our
examinations." Before Bruce left they had given him _their_ whole story,
too, and a good deal more than they had intended telling him, forgetting
what Colonel Sure Pop had told Uncle Jack about the way Bruce had been
holding back the Safety First work from Maine to California.

Bruce said little as he listened to their story, but he did some quick
thinking. So this was the sort of thing he had fought so long and so
stubbornly--this "Boost for Safety" talk which he had called
"new-fangled theory," but to which he owed the life of his own little
girl!

As they talked, two Scouts came into the front hall to remind the twins
that their birthday supper was waiting, but Bruce was too interested to
see them. Quick at reading signs, as all good Scouts are, Colonel Sure
Pop and Uncle Jack watched and listened for a moment, then smilingly
went back to the supper table.

"You were right, Colonel, as usual," said Uncle Jack, heartily. "Bruce
is coming around. He'll be the biggest Safety Booster in the whole
United States before morning!"

"Sure pop!" exulted the dapper little Colonel. "I'll have to wire my
King about this day's work!"

* * * * *

It was long after Bonnie's bedtime, and the nurse waiting in the hallway
was beginning to wonder if her little mistress was never coming
upstairs. On the avenue outside, in the soft, mellow Hallowe'en breeze,
jack o' lanterns and soot bags were still being paraded up and down,
horns blowing, rattles clattering. Two street urchins, bolder than the
rest, crept up to the great iron gate in front of the Bruce mansion and
vainly struggled to lift it off its hinges. Still the mill owner sat
before the fire, Bonnie on his knee. He could not bear to let her go
tonight, even to bed.

In the flames dancing on the hearth, the big man was seeing
visions--visions of the Safety First work that would be started tomorrow
morning in every mill in the whole Bruce chain. "I'll telegraph every
manager to get busy on Safety work at once if he wants to hold his job,"
he thought to himself. "I won't lose another day!" For after hearing
from the Dalton twins and from Chance Carter the way _their_ spare time
was spent, his own work in the world seemed suddenly very small and
mean. Here he--Bruce the rich, Bruce the pow