The Sagebrusher | Page 7

swinging on the straps as it screeched its
way around the curves, through the crowded portions of the city. It was
long before they got seats, three-quarters of an hour, for they lived far
out. Ten dollars a week does not give much in the way of quarters. It
might have been guessed that these two were partners, room-mates.
"Gee! These cars is fierce," said Annie Squires, with a smile and a wide

glance into the eyes of a young man against whom she had been flung,
although she spoke to her companion.
Mary Warren made no complaint. Her face, calm and gentle, carried
neither repining nor resignation, but a high and resolute courage. She
shrank far as she might, like a gentlewoman, from personal contact
with other human beings; the little droop beginning at the corners of
her mouth gave proof of her weariness, but there was a thoroughbred
vigor, a silken-strong fairness about her, which, with the self-respecting
erectness in her carriage, rather belied the common garb she wore. Her
frock was that of the sales-woman, her gloves were badly worn, her
boots began to show signs of breaking, her hat was of nondescript sort,
of small pretensions--yet Mary Warren's attitude, less of weariness than
of resistance, had something of the ivory-fine gentlewoman about it,
even here at the end of a rasping winter day.
Annie Squires was dressed with a trifle more of the pretension which
ten dollars a week allows. She carried a sort of rude and frank vitality
about her, a healthful color in her face, not wholly uncomely. She was a
trifle younger than Mary Warren--the latter might have been perhaps
five and twenty; perhaps a little older, perhaps not quite so old--but
none the less seemed if not the more strong, at least the more
self-confident of the two. A great-heart, Annie Squires; out of nothing,
bound for nowhere. Two great-hearts, indeed, these two tired girls,
going home.
"Well, the Dutch seems to be having their own troubles now," said
Annie after a time, when at length the two were able to find seats, a
trifle to themselves in a corner of the car. "Looks like they might learn
how the war thing goes the other way 'round. Gee! I wish't I was a man!
I'd show 'em peace!"
She went on, passing from one headline to the next of the evening
paper which they took daily turns in buying. Mary Warren began to
grow more grave of face as she heard the news from the lands where
not long ago had swung and raged in their red grapple the great armies
of the world.

Then a sudden remorse came to Annie. She put out a hand to Mary
Warren's arm. "Don't mind, Sis," said she. "Plenty more besides your
brother is gone. Lookit here."
"He was all I had," said Mary simply, her lips trembling.
"Yes, I know. But what's up to-night, Mollie? You're still. Anything
gone wrong at the store?" She was looking at her room-mate keenly.
This was their regular time for mutual review and for the restoring
gossip of the day.
"Well, you see, Annie, they told me that times were hard now after the
war, and more girls ready to work." Mary Warren only answered after a
long time. A passenger, sitting near, was just rising to leave the car.
Annie also said nothing for a time. "It looks bad, Mollie," said she,
sagely.
Mary Warren made no answer beyond nodding bravely, high-headed.
Ten dollars a week may be an enormous sum, even when countries but
now have been juggling billions carelessly.
They were now near the end of their daily journey. Presently they
descended from the car and, bent against the icy wind, made their way
certain blocks toward the door which meant home for them. They
clumped up the stairs of the wooden building to the third floor, and
opened the door to their room.
It was cold. There was no fire burning in the stove--they never left one
burning, for they furnished their own fuel; and in the morning, even in
the winter time, they rose and dressed in the cold.
"Never mind, dear," said Annie again, and pushed Mary down into the
rocking chair as she would have busied herself with the kindling. "Let
me, now. I wish't coal wasn't so high. There's times I almost lose my
nerve."
A blue and yellow flame at last began back of the mica-doored stove

which furnished heat for the room. The girls, too tired and cold to take
off their wraps, sat for a time, their hands against the slowly heating
door. Now and again they peered in to see how the fire was doing.
Mary Warren rose and laid aside her street garb. When she turned back
again