It is no easy matter to overcome prejudices many centuries old, and meet the criticism of women who have nothing to do but criticize. Those who were “mistresses,” and wanted “servants,”--someone to do their will at any moment from early morning till late evening,--were not pleased with the new way if they tried it; but the women who had interests of their own to attend to; who merely wanted their homes kept clean, and the food well cooked and served, were pleased. The speed, the accuracy, the economy; the pleasant, quiet, assured manner of these skilled employees was a very different thing from the old slipshod methods of the ordinary general servant. So the work slowly prospered, while Diantha began to put in execution the new plan she had been forced into. While it matured, Mrs. Thaddler matured hers. With steady dropping she had let fall far and wide her suspicions as to the character of Union House. “It looks pretty queer to me!” she would say, confidentially, “All those girls together, and no person to have any authority over them! Not a married woman in the house but that washerwoman,--and her husband's a fool!” “And again; You don't see how she does it? Neither do I! The expenses must be tremendous--those girls pay next to nothing,--and all that broth and brown bread flying about town! Pretty queer doings, I think!” “The men seem to like that caffeteria, don't they?” urged one caller, perhaps not unwilling to nestle Mrs. Thaddler, who flushed darkly as she replied. “Yes, they do. Men usually like that sort of place.” “They like good food at low prices, if that's what you mean,” her visitor answered. “That's not all I mean--by a long way,” said Mrs. Thaddler. She said so much, and said it so ingeniously, that a dark rumor arose from nowhere, and grew rapidly. Several families discharged their Union House girls. Several girls complained that they were insultingly spoken to on the street. Even the lunch patronage began to fall off. Diantha was puzzled--a little alarmed. Her slow, steady lifting of the prejudice against her was checked. She could not put her finger on the enemy, yet felt one distinctly, and had her own suspicions. But she also had her new move well arranged by this time. Then a maliciously insinuating story of the place came out in a San Francisco paper, and a flock of local reporters buzzed in to sample the victim. They helped themselves to the luncheon, and liked it, but that did not soften their pens. They talked with such of the girls as they could get in touch with, and wrote such versions of these talks as suited them. They called repeatedly at Union House, but Diantha refused to see them. Finally she was visited by the Episcopalian clergyman. He had heard her talk at the Club, was favorably impressed by the girl herself, and honestly distressed by the dark stories he now heard about Union House.