George, you are in a very trying position. The company of course depends on your loyalty, and the employees also have great confidence in your fairness. What can you do? If disloyal to the Company, you lose your position. What more can I do, except to pray! Above all, my dear, be loyal to your conscience and do right. Be just. Come and see me at your earliest possible moment. Your own loving Gertrude. Gertrude's brave letter reached George before ten o'clock the next morning, and greatly cheered him. He was never more occupied, but he snatched a moment to say in reply: Office of The Harrisville Iron & Steel Co. _Dearest Peacemaker_,-- Glad for your heroic letter. It sings the peace-song of the angels. I shall be guarded in my words and actions. Good things, I hope, will result from all this terrible commotion. I confess I see only darkness ahead, save as it is pierced by the light of your love. We have a thousand men this morning building a fence eight feet high around our works. It looks like war to the knife under the present policy. Of course I can't say much till my opportunity comes, if it ever does. Believe me, darling Gertrude, Wholly yours, George. The note was dispatched by special messenger. Its receipt and contents gave comfort to Gertrude. Colonel Harris left his breakfast table almost abruptly. One egg, a piece of toast, and a cup of coffee were all he ate. It was an earlier meal than usual which the Swiss cook had prepared, and by half past six Colonel Harris started from home to his office, Gertrude from her chamber window kissing her hand to him, saying, "Keep cool, father!" By seven o'clock he and his capable manager were busily using the two office telephones. Before nine o'clock, all the teams of several lumber firms were engaged in hauling fence posts, two by four scantling, and sufficient sixteen foot boards to construct a fence eight feet high about the entire premises of the Harrisville Iron & Steel Co.'s plant. This early action of the company for a time confused the strike managers, as they could not divine whether Colonel Harris in a fit of despair planned to fence in and close down his mills, or, perhaps, once getting his plant enclosed, purposed to eject all members of labor organizations, and again as in a former strike, attempt to start his plant with non-union labor. The leader of the strike was a brawny man with full beard, unkempt hair, and a face far from attractive. "Captain O'Connor," as the labor lodges knew him, was the recognized leader of the strike. He was not an employee at the steel mills, but an expert manager of strikes, receiving a good salary, and employed by the officers of the central union. At 2:30 o'clock a secret meeting of the officers of the several labor lodges and Captain O'Connor was held behind closed doors. All were silent, when suddenly O'Connor rose and began to denounce capital, charging it with the robbery of honest labor.