got to pay him for it being handy. That's her money he's got in his pocket, only if you knocked him down and took it out for her you'd be a thief. At least, they'd say you were and send you to prison."

"Who's the other, I wonder?" said Ned. "He looks more like a man."

The other was a shrewd-looking, keen-faced, sparely-built man, with somewhat aquiline nose and straight narrow forehead, not at all bad-looking or evil-looking and with an air of strong determination; in short, what one calls a masterful man. He was dressed well but quietly. A gold-bound hair watch guard that crossed his high-buttoned waistcoat was his only adornment; his slender hands, unlike the fat man's podgy fingers, were bare of rings. He was sitting alone, and after the fat man left him returned again to the reading of an afternoon paper while he lunched.

"His name's Strong," said. Nellie, turning to Ned with a peculiar smile.
"That fat man has robbed me and this lean man has robbed you, I suppose.
As he looks more like a man it won't be as bad though, will it?"

"What are you getting at, Nellie?" asked Ned, not understanding but looking at the shrewd man intently, nevertheless.

"Don't you know the name? Of course you don't though. Well, he's managing director of the Great Southern Mortgage Agency, a big concern that owns hundreds and hundreds of stations. At least, the squatters own the stations and the Agency owns the squatters, and he as good as owns the Agency. You're pretty sure to have worked for him many a time without knowing it, Ned."

Ned's eyes flashed. Nellie had to kick his foot under the table for fear he would say or do something that would attract the attention of the unsuspecting lean man.

"Don't be foolish, Ned," urged Nellie, in a whisper. "What's the good of spluttering?"

"Why, it was one of their stations on the Wilkes Downs that started cutting wages two years ago. Whenever a manager is particularly mean he always puts it down to the Agency. The Victorian fellows say it was this same concern that first cut wages down their way. And the New Zealanders too. I'd just like to perform on him for about five minutes."

Ned uttered his wish so seriously that Nellie laughed out loud, at which
Ned laughed too.

"So he's the man who does all the mischief, is he?" remarked Ned, again glaring at his industrial enemy. "Who'd think it to look at him? He doesn't look a bad sort, does he?"

"He looks a determined man, I think," said Nellie. "Mr. Stratton says he's the shrewdest capitalist in Australia and that he'll give the unions a big fight for it one of these days. He says he has a terrible hatred of unionism and thinks that there's no half-way between smashing them up and letting them smash the employers up. His company pays 25 per cent. regularly every year on its shares and will pay 50 before he gets through with it."

"How?"

"How! Out of fellows like you, Ned, who think themselves so mighty independent and can't see that they're being shorn like sheep, in the same way, though not as much yet, as Mrs. Somerville is by old Church and the fat brute, as you call him. But then you rather like it I should think. Anyway, you told me you didn't want to do anything 'wild,' only to keep up wages. You'll have to do something 'wild' to keep up wages before he finishes."

"That's all right to talk, Nellie, but what can we do?" asked Ned, pulling his moustache. .

"Hire him instead of letting him hire you," answered Nellie, oracularly. "Those fat men are only good to put in museums, but these lean men are all right so long as you keep them in their place. They are our worst enemies when they're against us but our best friends when they're for us. They say Mr. Strong isn't like most of the swell set. He is straight to his wife and good to his children and generous to his friends and when he says a thing he sticks to it. Only he sees everything from the other side and doesn't understand that all men have got the same coloured blood."

"How can we hire him?" said Ned, after a pause. "They own everything."

Nellie shrugged her shoulders.

"You think we might take it," said Ned.

Nellie shrugged her shoulders again.

"I don't see how it can be done," he concluded.

"That's just it. You can't see how it can be done, and so nothing's done. Some men get drunk, and some men get religious, and others get enthusiastic for a pound a hundred. You haven't got votes up in Queensland, and if you had you'd probably give them to a lot of ignorant politicians. Men don't know, and they don't seem to want to know much, and they've got to be squeezed by men like him"—she nodded at Strong—"before they take any interest in themselves or in those who belong to them. For those who have an ounce of heart, though, I should think there'd been squeezing enough already."

She looked at Ned angrily. The scenes of the morning rose before him and tied his tongue.

"How do you know all these jokers, Nellie?" he asked. He had been going to put the question a dozen times before but it had slipped him in the interest of conversation.

"I only know them by sight. Mrs. Stratton takes me to the theatre with her sometimes and tells me who people are and all about them."

"Who's Mrs. Stratton? You were talking of Mr. Stratton, too, just now, weren't you?"

"Yes. The Strattons are very nice people, They're interested in the Labour movement, and I said I'd bring you round when I go to-night. I generally go on Saturday nights. They're not early birds, and we don't want to get there till half-past ten or so."

"Half-past ten! That's queer time."

"Yes, isn't it? Only——"

At that moment a waitress who had been arranging the next table came and took her place against the wall close behind Nellie. Such an opportunity to talk unionism was not to be lost, so Nellie unceremoniously dropped her conversation with Ned and enquired, as before stated, into the becapped girl's hours. The waitress was tall and well-featured, but sallow of skin and growing haggard, though barely 20, if that. Below her eyes were bluish hollows. She suffered plainly from the disorders caused by constant standing and carrying, and at this end of her long week was in evident pain.

* * * * *

"You're not allowed to talk either?" she asked the waitress, when the manager had disappeared.

"No. They're very strict. You get fined if you're seen chatting to customers and if you're caught resting. And you get fined if you break anything, too. One girl was fined six shillings last week."