"A lady to see you, sir."

John did not take his eyes from the work on his desk. "All right, Jimmy, show her in."

The general manager read on to the bottom of the typewritten page, signed his name to the sheet, placed it in the proper basket and turned in his chair.

"Helen!"

Little Maggie's princess lady was so lovely that afternoon, as she stood there framed in the doorway of the manager's office that even her brother noticed.

She was laughing at his surprise, and there was a half teasing, half serious look in her eyes that was irresistible.

"By George, you are a picture, Helen!" John exclaimed, with not a little brotherly pride in his face and voice. "But what is the idea? What are you down here for--all dolled up like this?"

She blushed with pleasure at his compliment. "That is very nice of you, John; you are a dear to notice it. Are you going to ask me to sit down, or must you put me out for interrupting?"

He was on his feet instantly. "Forgive me; I am so stunned by the unexpected honor of your visit that I forget my manners."

When she was seated, he continued, "And now what is it? what can I do for you, sister?"

She looked about the office--at his desk and through the open door into the busy outer room. "Are you quite sure that you have time for me?"

"Surest thing in the world," he returned, with a reassuring smile. Then to a man who at that moment appeared in the doorway, "All right, Tom." And to Helen, "Excuse me just a second, dear."

She watched him curiously as he turned sheet after sheet of the papers the man handed him, seeming to absorb the pages at a glance, while a running fire of quick questions, short answers, terse comments and clear-cut instructions accompanied the examination.

Helen had never before been inside the doors of the industrial plant to which her father had literally given his life. In those old-house days, when Adam worked with Pete and the Interpreter, she had gone sometimes to the outer gate to meet her father when his day's work was done. On rare occasions her automobile had stopped in front of the office. That was all.

In a vague, indefinite way the young woman realized that her education, her pleasures, the dresses she wore, her home on the hill, everything that she had, in fact, came to her somehow from those great dingy, unsightly buildings. She knew that people who were not of her world worked there for her father. Sometimes there were accidents--men were killed. There had been strikes that annoyed her father. But no part of it all had ever actually touched her. She accepted it as a matter of course--without a thought--as she accepted all of the established facts in nature. The Mill existed for her as the sun existed. It never occurred to her to ask why. There was for her no personal note in the droning, moaning voice of its industry. There was nothing of personal significance in the forest of tall stacks with their overhanging cloud of smoke. Indeed, there had been, rather, something sinister and forbidding about the place. The threatening aspect of the present industrial situation was in no way personal to her except, perhaps, as it excited her father and disturbed John.

"You've got it all there, Tom," said the manager, finishing his examination of the papers. "Good work, too. Baird will have those specifications on that Miller and Wilson job in to-morrow, will he?"

"Yes, sir."

"Good, that's the stuff!"

The man was smiling as he moved toward the door.

"Oh, Tom, just a moment."

Still smiling, the man turned back.

"I want you to meet my sister. Helen, may I present Mr. Conway? Tom is one of our Mill family, you know, mighty important member, too--regular shark at figuring all sorts of complicated calculations that I couldn't work out in a month of Sundays." He laughed with boyish happiness and pride in Tom's superior accomplishments.

It was a simple little incident, but there was something in it somewhere that moved Helen Ward strangely. A spirit that was new to her seemed to fill the room. She felt it as one may feel the bigness of the mountains or sense the vast reaches of the ocean. These two men, employer and employee, were in no way conscious of their relationship as she understood it. Tom did not appear to realize that he was working _for_ John--he seemed rather to feel that he was working _with_ John.

When the man was gone, she asked again, timidly, "Are you sure, brother, that I am not in the way?"

"Forget it!" he cried. "Tell me what I can do for you."

"I want to see the Mill," she answered.

John did not apparently quite understand her request. "You want to see the Mill?" he repeated.

She nodded eagerly. "I want to see it all--not just the office but where the men work--everything."

She laughed at his bewildered expression as the sincerity of her wish dawned upon him.

"But what in the world"--he began--"why this sudden interest in the Mill, Helen?"

Half teasing, half laughing, she answered, "You didn't really think, did you, John, that I would forget everything you said to me at the old house?"

"No," he said, doubtfully. "At least, I suppose I didn't. But, honestly, I didn't think that I had made much of an impression."

She made a little gesture of helpless resignation. "Here I am just the same and so much interested already that I can't tear myself away. Come on, let's start--that is, if you really have the time to take me."

Time to take her! John Ward would have lost the largest contract he had ever dreamed of securing rather than miss taking Helen through the Mill.

* * * * *

With an old linen duster, which had hung in the office closet since Adam Ward's day, to cover her from chin to shoes, and a cap that John himself often wore about the plant, to replace her hat, they set out.

Helen's first impression, as she stood just inside the door to the big main room of the plant, was fear. To her gentle eyes the scene was one of terrifying confusion and unspeakable dangers.

Those great machines were grim and threatening monsters with ponderous jaws and arms and chains that seemed all too light to control their sullen strength. The noise--roaring, crashing, clanking, moaning, shrieking, hissing--was overpowering in its suggestion of the ungoverned tumult that belonged to some strange, unearthly realm. Everywhere, amid this fearful din and these maddening terrors, flitting through the murky haze of steam and smoke and dust, were men with sooty faces and grimy arms. Never had the daughter of Adam Ward seen men at work like this. She drew closer to John's side and held to his arm as though half expecting him to vanish suddenly and leave her alone in this monstrous nightmare.

Looking down at her, John laughed aloud and put his arm about her reassuringly. "Great game, old girl!" he said, with a wholesome pride in his voice. "This is the life!"

And all at once she remembered that this _was_, indeed, life--life as she had never seen it, never felt it before. And this life game--this greatest of all games--was the game that John played with such absorbing interest day after day.

"I can understand now why you are not so devoted to tennis and teas as you used to be," she returned, laughing back at him with a new admiration in her face.

Then John led her into the very midst of the noisy scene. Carefully he guided her steps through the seeming hurry and confusion of machinery and men. Now they paused before one of those grim monsters to watch its mighty work. Now they stopped to witness the terrific power displayed by another giant that lifted, with its great arms of steel, a weight of many tons as easily as a child would handle a toy. Again, they stepped aside from the path of an engine on its way to some distant part of the plant, or stood before a roaring furnace, or paused to watch a group of men, or halted while John exchanged a few brief words with a superintendent or foreman. And always with boyish enthusiasm John talked to her of what they saw, explaining, illustrating, making the purpose and meani............