shing her way frantically through the
people filling the yard she climbed the tower stairs and made her way
into one of the spinning rooms. The frames were stilled, the overseer
and second hands, thrust aside, looked on helplessly while the intruders
harangued, cajoled or threatened the operatives, some of whom were cowed
and already departing; others, sullen and resentful, remained standing
in the aisles; and still others seemed to have caught the contagion of
the strike. Suddenly, with reverberating strokes, the mill bells rang
out, the electric gongs chattered, the siren screeched, drowning the
voices. Janet did not pause, but hurried from room to room until, in
passing through an open doorway in the weaving department she ran into
Mr. Caldwell. He halted a moment, in surprise at finding her there,
calling her by name. She clung to his sleeve, and again she asked the
question:--

"Where's Mr. Ditmar?"

Caldwell shook his head. His answer was the same as Edward's. "I don't
know," he shouted excitedly above the noise. "We've got to get this mob
out before they do any damage."

He tore himself away, she saw him expostulating with the overseer, and
then she went on. These tower stairs, she remembered, led to a yard
communicating by a little gate with the office entrance. The door of
the vestibule was closed, but the watchman, Simmons, recognizing her,
permitted her to enter. The offices were deserted, silent, for the bells
and the siren had ceased their clamour; the stenographers and clerks had
gone. The short day was drawing to a close, shadows were gathering in
the corners of Ditmar's room as she reached the threshold and gazed
about her at the objects there so poignantly familiar. She took off
her coat. His desk was littered with books and papers, and she started,
mechanically, to set it in order, replacing the schedule books on the
shelves, sorting out the letters and putting them in the basket. She
could not herself have told why she should take up again these trivial
tasks as though no cataclysmic events had intervened to divide
forever the world of yesterday from that of to-morrow. With a movement
suggestive of tenderness she was picking up Ditmar's pen to set it in
the glass rack when her ear caught the sound of voices, and she stood
transfixed, listening intently. There were footsteps in the corridor,
the voices came nearer; one, loud and angered, she detected above the
others. It was Ditmar's! Nothing had ha