She gripped herself and her iron with a visible effort, and
dabbed futilely at the frail, frilled garment on the board under
her hand.

"I thought she'd got'em again--didn't you?" the girl said.

"It's a shame, a women of her age, and . . . condition," Saxon
answered, as she frilled a lace ruffle with a hot fluting-iron.
Her movements were delicate, safe, and swift, and though her face
was wan with fatigue and exhausting heat, there was no slackening
in her pace.

"An' her with seven, an' two of 'em in reform school," the girl
at the next board sniffed sympathetic agreement. "But you just
got to come to Weasel Park to-morrow, Saxon. The Bricklayers' is
always lively--tugs-of-war, fat-man races, real Irish jiggin',
an' . . . an' everything. An' The floor of the pavilion's swell."

But the elderly woman brought another interruption. She dropped
her iron on the shirtwaist, clutched at the board, fumbled it,
caved in at the knees and hips, and like a half-empty sack
collapsed on the floor, her long shriek rising in the pent room
to the acrid smell of scorching cloth. The women at the boards
near to her scrambled, first, to the hot iron to save the cloth,
and then to her, while the forewoman hurried belligerently down
the aisle. The women farther away continued unsteadily at their
work, losing movements to the extent of a minute's set-back to
the totality of the efficiency of the fancy-starch room.

"Enough to kill a dog," the girl muttered, thumping her iron down