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CHAPTER II

L

I

OLA watched the unrelenting back, eloquent in in its expression of disapproval, as Richard strode away from her. Their conversation left her in a curious state of mind. If the subject of marriage had not been mentioned, she could have retained, for a time at least, the exhilaration she had experienced; as it was, Dick's inability to hold himself consistent to his own convictions made her happiness premature, and she suffered from the reaction.

Richard had put into words ideas which with her had before been merely fugitive thoughts, and to have some one crystallize them was in itself a real inspiration. He admitted that through his experiences he had gained an ability to force events in his life to assume their proper relative positions, yet when she shrank from assuming responsibilities for which she believed them both to be at present unprepared, he was hurt and offended. If Richard had looked upon the war as offering the privilege of meeting death in a manner equal to its greatness, by the same token he should look upon war's aftermath as giving one the opportunity to meet marriage in the same spirit.

Lola

Marriage to the average woman meant a home and the companionship of husband and children. could not bring herself to consider this as the highest expression of herself. It was a part of that expression, but not the whole of it. "I had been on the outside of the world, and at last I became a part of it," Richard had said. He felt it, just as she did, he was able to translate that feeling into words, but he was not translating it into action. If they married now, she was convinced that he would never attain the heights which his vision flashed before him. His home and his family would give him relief from his restlessness and from the present unsettled nature of his living, and he and she would settle down into the same self-centered, humdrum eixstence that thousands and hundreds of thousands of families are living today. If this were possible, with the newly-created conditions crying for intelligent, unselfish, sacrificing service, then the agony and bloodshed of those awful years would count for nothing. Richard admitted that his vision was now but a memory of disappointed ideals, and that he had given up all hope of compelling its realization. That must not . . . should not be. For his own sake and for hers she must insist that he live up to it, and in so doing make it possible that their union, freed from fear of what the future might do for them, might also be freed from all limitations, and devoted to the great

common cause.

II

When Richard left Lola he took a short cut through an opening in the brick wall which surrounded the

garden, across an unreclaimed field onto the road. He had no definite objective, his one conscious thought being that he was out of sorts with Lola for her continued postponement of their wedding. Being out of sorts had come to be a habit with him. His work at the factory was distasteful, his home life associated itself with daily wrangles with his father, and now he had reached a point where he began to question Lola's devotion, and Lola since his return had been his one haven of refuge. She had changed, . . that was obvious. Was it possible that the new Lola had lost, to a degree at least, her former love for him? Picking up a stick, he viciously hacked off the heads of the unoffending daisies which showed on either side of the walk, meekly bowing their heads to his unwarranted reprisals.

Suddenly he became conscious of some one behind him and turned.

"Hello, Olga!" he exclaimed, glad to have his mood interrupted, and waiting for the girl to overtake him. "What strides you take!" she cried, out of breath as she stood beside him; "I thought I should never catch you."

"Where were you?"

"Waiting in front of Mr. Stewart's house. I expected you to come out that way."

"Waiting for what?"

"For you," she replied archly, looking up at him out of her big, brown eyes as if ready for reproof, . . "for you," she repeated, "Mr. Richard Norton."

Richard laughed at her defiant manner quite as much

as at her words. She made a picture as she stood there with militant attitude, in her pink gingham frock, which set off her dark skin and flashing eyes. Olga Mirovich would attract attention anywhere. Her lithe body ever seemed too small to contain a spirit so fearless and dominating, her eyes spoke even more forcefully than her lips, and her face registered her emotions with the rapidity and accuracy of a photographic plate.

"Why should you be waiting for me?" Richard asked. "Why shouldn't I?”

"I'll say why shouldn't you?" Richard acquiesced, laughing again.

The girl's face lighted and she placed her hand hesitatingly on his arm.

"That is what I told Tony, but he laughed at me." "Tony Lemholtz?" Richard asked. "Why should he laugh at you?"

""The son of the great James Norton will not stoop to speak with a factory-girl,' he said. 'But he speaks to me every day in the shop,' I answered, and I tossed my head. . . like this. like this. Then Tony laughed. 'Perhaps in the shop,' he said; 'but it is different outside."" "Tony doesn't know me as well as you do, does he, Olga?.. Come, we will walk along together and you will tell me why you waited for me."

III

They walked on, but in silence. Richard looked at his companion occasionally, and saw that she was hesitating for just the right words to convey her message. Olga was a character at the plant. Ambitious, alert,

active, better educated than her companions, she was the best operative in her department, and recognized by the other women in the works as their leader and spokesman. Richard had first noticed her one day when she attacked another girl who taunted her with being a Russian. The workmen laughingly separated them, and while the two assailants were held far enough apart to prevent bodily injury the girl poured out the vials of her wrath upon her tormentor.

"Don't you dare say that, Katie McGuire!" she cried passionately with flaming eyes. "I was a Russian. My father and mother were Russians, but became Americans. Who could remain a Russian who had seen her grandmother crippled for life by blows from the knout

whose grandfather died from exhaustion in the mines of Siberia, whose murdered relatives shed a long trail of blood straight to the palace gate of the White Czar! I am not a Russian, Katie McGuire! My father and mother and I escaped and came to this country. When our ship entered the great harbor of New York my father pointed to the statue where Liberty holds up her torch, and said to my mother, 'Now at last I am a man you are a human being . . . and we are all Americans.' If you say again I am a Russian, Katie McGuire, I will bite your ear off! I can do it!"

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Never had Richard seen such passionate fire as dominated that slight, pulsating figure. She seemed the embodiment of the sublime courage which finally enabled her people to throw off the yoke which centuries of serfdom had locked around their necks, even though they, like Olga, are still children too undeveloped to

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