and brain, and it was Glen’s dream to bring the Altonia up to standard, but Manders confided to her that it was in a very bad way, financially. Between the superintendent who died, Miss Minnie, and blundering old Ben, the concern had very nearly gone on the rocks; it would take every effort to set her soundly afloat again.

[74]

“And old Carey wants money! You see, it cost him a lot to send his girl to Europe, and now she’s home, and he says she wants to do the house over from cellar to attic,” Luke Manders told Glen. “That’s why he’s putting on the screws.”

“It’s abominable!” she flared. “Grinding down the hands, keeping his mill twenty years behind the times, so that Nancy can have all the things she doesn’t need! Luke, I can’t stand it! I’m not going to stand it! I’ll find a way——”

“Careful!” he steadied her. “I know how you feel, Glen, but we’ve got to be patient.”

“Patient!” She blazed with chivalrous indignation, “I don’t want to be patient. I want to do something now!”

The mountaineer shook his head. “Wait. Trust me.”

Her hot blue gaze plumbed the dark depths of his.[75] “I do, Luke! You know I trust you! But why can’t I go to Nancy Carey, and make her come down here and see conditions and contrast them with other mills, and realize— She’s a soft little thing, but she’s gentle and kind, and——”

[75]

He cut her short. “Yes—gentle and kind like old Carey’s gentle and kind—when it won’t interfere with their own comforts or profits. Carey’s good-natured; he wouldn’t kick a dog or curse a nigger, but he’ll grind every ounce of work out of his hands and house ’em like swine, and never figure he’s being hard. No, Glen—you wait!”

She was mutinous. “Wait, wait, wait! I’m sick of it, Luke? What am I waiting for?”

He considered in silence for a long moment. “Wait till I’m so necessary to him that he’ll have to listen to me.”

“But, Luke, he listens to you now! It’s wonderful the way he talks to you and takes your advice about things! Why, he’d listen to you this minute!” She came close to him, eager, ardent.

“Yes—and laugh at me, and tell me to mind my own business! And my business is to try to get the mill out of the red ink just now. No, Glen,” he said again, gravely, 

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