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When the column of figures under the heading known as “Profits,” and the column of figures under the heading known as “Loss” are so unevenly balanced that the wrong side of the ledger sags, then to the listening stockholders there comes the painful thought that at the next regular meeting it is perilously possible that the reading may come under the heads of Assets and Liabilities.

There had been a meeting in the offices of the T. A. Buck Featherloom Petticoat Company, New York. The quarterly report had had a startlingly lop-sided sound. After it was over Mrs. Emma McChesney, secretary of the company, followed T. A. Buck, its president, into the big, bright show-room. T. A. Buck’s hands were thrust deep into his pockets. His teeth worried a cigar, savagely. Care, that clawing, mouthing hag, perched on his brow, tore at his heart.

He turned to face Emma McChesney.

“Well,” he said, bitterly, “it hasn’t taken us long, has it? Father’s been dead a little over a year. In that time we’ve just about run this great concern, the pride of his life, into the ground.”

Mrs. Emma McChesney, calm, cool, unruffled, scrutinized the harassed man before her for a long minute.

“What rotten football material you would have made, wouldn’t you?” she observed.

“Oh, I don’t know,” answered T. A. Buck, through his teeth. “I can stand as stiff a scrimmage as the next one. But this isn’t a game. You take things too lightly. You’re a woman. I don’t think you know what this means.”

Emma McChesney’s lips opened as do those of one whose tongue’s end holds a quick and stinging retort. Then they closed again. She walked over to the big window that faced the street. When she had stood there a moment, silent, she swung around and came back to where T. A. Buck stood, still wrapped in gloom.

“Maybe I don’t take myself seriously. I’d have been dead ten years ago if I had. But I do take my job seriously. Don’t forget that for a minute. You talk the way a man always talks when his pride is hurt.”

“Pride! It isn’t that.”

“Oh, yes, it is. I didn’t sell T. A. Buck’s Featherloom Petticoats on the road for almost ten years without learning a little something about men and business. When your father died, and I learned that he had shown his appreciation of my work and loyalty by making me secretary of this great company, I didn’t think of it as a legacy–a stroke of good fortune.”

“No?”

“No. To me it was a sacred trust–something to be guarded, nursed, cherished. And now you say we’ve run this concern into the ground. Do you honestly think that?”

T. A. shrugged impotent shoulders. “Figures don’t lie.” He plunged into another fathom of gloom. “Another year like this and we’re done for.”

Emma McChesney came over and put one firm hand on T. A. Buck’s drooping shoulder. It was a strange little act for a woman–the sort of thing a man does when he would hearten another man.

“Wake up!” she said, lightly. “Wake up, and listen to the birdies sing. There isn’t going to be another year like this. Not if the planning, and scheming, and brain-racking that I’ve been doing for the last two or three months mean anything.”

T. A. Buck seated himself as one who is weary, body and mind.

“Got another new one?”

Emma McChesney regarded him a moment thoughtfully. Then she stepped to the tall show-case, pushed back the sliding glass door, and pointed to the rows of brilliant-hued petticoats that hung close-packed within.

“Look at ’em!” she commanded, disgust in her voice. “Look at ’em!”

T. A. Buck raised heavy, lack-luster eyes and looked. What he saw did not seem to interest him. Emma McChesney drew from the rack a skirt of king’s blue satin messaline and held it at arm’s length.

“And they call that thing a petticoat! Why, fifteen years ago the material in this skirt wouldn’t have made even a fair-sized sleeve.”

T. A. Buck regarded the petticoat moodily. “I don’t see how they get around in the darned things. I honestly don’t see how they wear ’em.”

“That’s just it. They don’t wear ’em. There you have the root of the whole trouble.”