n, and the
machine began to whiz. "Tell all the boys 'How.'"

For half an hour they ran about the streets at his direction, while he
talked on about his youthful joys and sorrows. "You wouldn't suppose a
lad could have any fun in such a place as this," he said, musingly, "but
I did. I was a careless, go-divil pup, and had a power of friends, and
these alleys and bare brick walls were the only play-ground we had. You
can't cheat a boy--he's goin' to have a good time if he has three grains
of corn in his belly and a place to sleep when he's tired. I was all
right till me old dad started to put me into the factory to work; then I
broke loose. I could work for an hour or two as hard as anny one; but a
whole long day--not for Mart! Right there I decided to emigrate and grow
up with the Injuns."

Bertha listened to his musing comment with a new light upon his life.
She had little cause for the feeling of disgust which came to her while
studying the scenes of his boyhood--her own childhood had been almost as
humble, almost as cheerless--and yet she could not prevent a sinking at
the heart. The gambler, so picturesque in his wickedness, was becoming
commonplace. He rose from such petty conditions, after all.

Thus far the question of his family relations had not troubled her very
much, for, aside from the chance coming of Charles, she had had little
opportunity of knowing anything about the Haneys, and they had seemed a
very long way off; but now, as she was rushing down upon New York City,
with the promise of not only finding the father, but of taking him back
with them to live, she began to doubt. His character was of the greatest
importance, in view of his taking a seat beside their fire.

It was singular, it was bewildering, this change in her estimate of
Marshall Haney. The deeper he sank in reminiscent meditation the farther
he withdrew from the bold and splendid freebooter he had once seemed to
her. She was now unjust to him for he was still capable of what his kind
call "standing pat." The rough-and-ready borderman was still housed
under the same thatch of hair with the sentimental old Irishman, and yet
it would have sorely puzzled the keenest observer to discover the
relationship of that handsome, rather serious-browed, richly clothed
young woman and her big, elderly, garrulous companion. Bertha was not
easy to classify, in herself, for she gave out an air of reserve not
readily accounted for. She looked to be the w