Annie Kilburn

"Then, perhaps," he comfortably suggested, "it's a sign you're not intended

to get rid of it."

"What _do_ you mean?"

"Why don't you go on," he irresponsibly adventured further, "and establish

a Social Union?"

"Do you _mean_ it?"

"What was that notion of his"--they usually spoke of the minister

pronominally--"about getting the Savors going in a co-operative

boarding-house at Fall River? Putney said something about it."

Annie explained, as she had heard it from him, and from the Savors since

his death, the minister's scheme for a club, in which the members should

contribute the labour and the provisions, and should live cheaply and

wholesomely under the management of the Savors at first, and afterward

should continue them in charge, or not, as they chose. "He seemed to

have thought it out very carefully. But I supposed, of course, it was

unpractical."

"Was that why you were going in for it?" asked the doctor; and then he

spared her confusion in adding: "I don't see why it was unpractical. It

seems to me a very good notion for a Social Union. Why not try it here?

There isn't the same pressing necessity that there is in a big factory

town; but you have the money, and you have the Savors to make a beginning."

His tone was still half bantering; but it had become more and more serious,

so that she could say in earnest: "But the money is one of the drawbacks.

It was Mr. Peck's idea that the working people ought to do it all

themselves."

"Well, I should say that two-thirds of that money in the bank had come from

them. They turned out in great force to Mr. Brandreth's theatricals. And

wouldn't it be rather high-handed to use their money for anything but the

Union?"

"You don't suppose," said Annie hotly, "that I would spend a cent of it

on the grounds of that idiotic monument? I would pay for having it blown

up with dynamite! No, I can't have anything more to do with the wretched

affair. My touch is fatal." The doctor laughed, and she added: "Besides, I

believe most heartily with Mr. Peck that no person of means and leisure can

meet working people except in the odious character of a patron, and if I

didn't respect them, I respect myself too much for that. If I were ready to

go in with them and start the Social Union on his basis, by helping do

house-work--_scullion_-work--for it, and eating and living with them,

I might try; but I know from experience I'm not. I haven't the need, and to

pretend that I have, to forego my comforts and luxuries in a make-believe

that I haven't them, would be too ghastly a farce, and I won't."