He would have rambled on willingly, but Amy cut in with the statement that she must be off, squeezed Jean's hand encouragingly, and whisked out forthwith. Her abrupt exit seemed to disorder the deliberate clockwork of old Mr. Meyer's thoughts, for he sat some little time staring at a letter-file with his mouth ajar, till, recollecting himself at last, he brought forth, "As I was saying, my dear, I trust you'll like our ways,"--which Jean was certain he had not said at all,--and thereupon led her to the door of one of the workrooms and turned her over to its forewoman, a stout Jewess with oily black hair combed low to disguise her too prominent ears. Work had begun, and the place was deafening with the whir of some thirty-odd close-ranked machines which, their ends almost touching, filled all the floor save the narrowest of aisles, where stood the chairs of the operators. To one of these sewing-machines and a huge pile of unstitched sleeves Jean was assigned. The task itself was simple, after the sound training of the refuge school, but the conditions under which she worked told heavily against her efficiency. The din was incessant, the light poor, the low-ceiled room crowded beyond its air-space, and the floor none too clean. As the morning drew on, the atmosphere became steadily worse. Now and then the forewoman would open a window,--she stood mainly by a door herself, turning and turning a showy ring upon her fat index finger,--but the relatively purer air thus admitted reached only the girls who worked nearest, of whom Jean was not one, and these soon shivered and complained of drafts. By the time the hands of a dingy clock marked ten, her head was throbbing violently and her spine seemed one prolonged ache. Her neighbors, except a thin-cheeked woman who stopped now and again to cough, turned off their stints with the regularity of long habit, straightening only to seize fresh supplies for their insatiable machines. At twelve o'clock, when whistles blew from all quarters and the other employees, dropping work as it stood, scrambled for lunch-boxes or wraps, Jean relaxed in her chair, too jaded to rise. Food was out of the question,--even the look of the pickle-scented luncheons which some of the cloak-makers opened made her ill,--but she presently dragged herself outdoors, and striking down a cross street, at whose farther end she could see trees, came to a little park distinguished by a marble arch, where she wandered aimlessly till she judged it time to return.