Recalling Mrs. Brown’s threat to turn the girl out if she again disturbed her roomers, Alice and I stopped in to see the landlady on our way to work. We explained that the milliner only wished to remain until the Christmas rush in her trade was over. After that she would be able to return to her home in Vermont or find another room. The landlady was so stubborn that Alice was finally forced to use her trump card. “My mother has ordered me to come home for Christmas—sent me a railroad ticket. I am leaving to-morrow immediately on leaving work. If you have really promised Mrs. Howard’s room to another person, I’ll ask her to use my room until my return. I paid my rent yesterday, you remember.” Finding that we were both determined to see that the milliner got a square deal, Mrs. Brown agreed not to give her any more trouble, to allow her to remain until the end of the milliners’ season. That day a circular letter from the firm, addressed to their employees in the premium station, aroused the little Jewess. “The owners!” she exclaimed. “It’s always the owners. In the subway they’ve even got papers stuck on the windows, urging us to pay higher fares so that the owners can get bigger dividends. I’m tired working for the owners.” “Who is not?” Nora demanded. “You said it!” the Protestant girl added. Though most of the articles being sold at the premium station were for Christmas presents, there was not much talk of Christmas behind the counters. The day preceding the holiday one girl joyfully confided to us all that her mother had promised the family a turkey dinner. “Turkey!” Nora exclaimed. Then she turned to me. “Groceries have gone up so that it takes all father and I can do to get the cheapest sorts of food for the children. Mother is a fine buyer, but we never have meat more than once a day. Then it is only stew or fish. I used to couldn’t bear either, but you’ll eat anything when you’re real hungry and dog-tired.” Late that afternoon Mr. Spencer stopped at my end of the counter. He had been watching me, he said, and he liked the way I worked. If I wished to come back after Christmas he would be glad to give me a permanent position. Though I had never intended to remain longer than the holiday rush, his manner was so pleasant, so sincerely appreciative, that before I realized it I had promised to report the day after Christmas. That evening, Christmas Eve, on returning from work I found a white sheet spread on the floor of the hall, just within the front door and by the side of the stairs. The lines into which the sheet had fallen struck me as peculiar, and I paused on the stairs and stared down at it. My eyes wandering farther made out the uniform of a policeman in the dusk of the rear hall.