Grabbing my file in one hand and my chair in the other, I marched to the other end of the table. Two days later this man was caught on the roof caressing one of the youngest of the girls in our department—she had been taken from school to help her parents support the family. What the men employees did to this fellow I never knew. He did not return, not even to finish that day. For one thing I am devoutly thankful—that Polly Preston is an American. It must be the most stupid of tasks to write about a human being who is forbidden to think for him or her self. I had as soon write about a white bait. During the later part of September, while still working for the District Board for the City of New York, I moved my belongings from the Jane Leonard to the top floor of a rooming-house in Greenwich Village—in the same house and on the same floor with Hildegarde Hook. Having met this young woman at the Y. W. C. A. and learned from herself that she was a writer, and from the Association that she was a problem, I decided to put her on my list of those and that to be investigated. Early in October the workers for the District Board began to be laid off. When my turn came I was not sorry. Jobs were plentiful, wages on the rise, and I was anxious to try another field. CHAPTER XIII “MORE DEADLY THAN THE MALE” The day after leaving the District Board for the City of New York I called at the employment department of the Y. W. The head of the department greeted me cordially. She had plenty of jobs—up-town, down-town, in all the suburbs. Reading her card catalogue of openings she stated that the Suffrage Party was offering ten dollars a week for canvassers, to work from five to nine evenings. “Could you place me where I would not be recognized?” I inquired. “Know many persons on the upper West Side?” she asked. I shook my head. “Ever see Miss Madeline Marks?” Again I shook my head. “She’s in charge at the West 78th Street branch. She’s been begging for help. I’ll give you a card——” The telephone at her elbow rang vigorously. She took off the receiver and applied it to her ear, all the while filling in a card introducing me to Miss Madeline Marks. “Daskam & Howe? Yes, I remember. You want addressers? Piece-work? One and a quarter a thousand? No, I can’t send you any one at that.” The secretary’s tone was final. “One fifty is the least they are taking. Most demand two. Are they getting it?” A satisfied chuckle. “I’ve listed about four vacancies to every one I’ve been able to fill. Of course if any one comes in—What’s that?—one dollar seventy-five?” “I’ll take it,” I whispered. “Tell them you’ll be able to send one.”