"The writer?"
"Yes. How strange it seems.... Oh, listen!"
Hagar's voice came to them, silver clear as a swinging bell. "Men and women—I am going to tell you why a woman like myself finds herself to-day under a mental and moral compulsion consciously to further what is called the Woman Movement—"
She spoke for ten minutes. When she ended and stepped from the platform, there followed a moment of silence, then applause broke forth. A dark-eyed, breathless girl, a lettered ribbon across her coat, caught her hand. "Hurry! We're waiting for you at the next stand. Rose Darragh is just through—" The two hastened away together, lithe and free beneath the falling brown leaves. A Columbia man was speaking well for the Men's League, but a good proportion of the crowd, John and Lily Fay among them, followed the wood-brown skirt.
They followed from stand to stand during the next hour, at the end of which time speaking was over for that day. The crowd broke up; the speakers, after some cheerful talk among themselves, gathered together their banners and pennants and went their several ways; committees looked after the taking-down of the stands.
Lily went over to Hagar Ashendyne standing with Rose Darragh and Molly Josslyn, talking to a little group of friendly people. "I'm Lily Goldwell. Do you remember?"
Hagar put her arms about her. "Oh, Lily, how is your head? Have you got that menthol pencil still?"
"My head got better and I threw it away. Oh, Hagar, you are a sight for sair een!... Yes, I'm Lily Fay, now. I'm on my way to England to join my husband. The boat sails next week. I'm at the ——. This is my brother-in-law, John Fay."
"I've got to be at Carnegie Hall to-night," said Hagar. "And I have something to do to-morrow through the day—but the evening's free. Won't you come to dinner with me—both of you? Yes, I want you, want you bad! Come early—come at six."
To-morrow was the serenest autumn day. Lily and John Fay walked from their hotel through a twilight tinted like a shell. When they came to the apartment house and were carried up, up, and left the elevator and rang at the door before them and it opened and they were admitted by a tidy coloured maid, it was to find themselves a little in advance of their hostess. Mary Magazine explained with slow, soft courtesy. "Miss Hagar cert'n'y meant to be home er long time befo' you come, she cert'n'y did. But there's er big strike goin' on—er lot of sewing-women—an' she went with Miss Elizabeth Eden early this mahnin', an' erwhile ago she telephone if you got heah first, you must 'scuse her anyhow an' make yo'selves at home 'cause she'll be heah presently. She had," Mary Magazine explained further, "to send Miss Thomasine to see somebody for her in Boston, so there isn't anybody to entertain you twel she comes. If you'll just make yo'selves comfortable—" and Mary Magazine smiled slowly and disappeared.