er to their never ceasing sorrow.

His escapades grew wilder, the reprimands of the faculty more severe. At
last came the final prank, which had resulted in his disgrace and
expulsion. Even then, she and mother was ready to forgive and had
written him to come home. No answer from Richard had ever been received.
Instead, came the news that the boy had disappeared, run away; the last
seen of him was boarding a train for the West. All efforts at tracing
him had proved futile, and to this day they knew not where he was.

Mother had never smiled again but had drooped and faded day by day.
Time and again Jane had urged moving to more congenial surroundings, to
a flat or cottage in the suburbs, to fresh air and sunshine. But no,
mother would not have it so; Richard might come back some day and how
could he find them if they moved away from the old home in the tenement
house?

Even now, when she is dying, her last thought is not for the girl beside
her, the girl who has toiled so patiently, watched so faithfully,
sacrificed all so generously, for mother and for Richard. Even in
delirium, her thoughts are only for the absent one; her words, that
insistent, heartrending cry for "Richard, Richard, Richard." Jane bows
her head in anguish but whispers low: "Thy will be done."

III.

Long since, the factory whistle has sounded the signal for release from
the day's toil. The workers in the factory, a small army of men and
women, boys and girls, poured forth from the doorways of the huge
buildings, swarmed up the street, laughing and chattering, and dispersed
to their several homes. The buzz and jarring of the machinery have
ceased and silence fills the place. Even the offices are deserted, with
the exception of one from which issues the steady click, click, of a
typewriter.

Jane Horton, private secretary and confidential clerk to the millionaire
president of the company, is a very busy as well as a very important
individual. The sound of that whistle means release for the workers in
the rooms above, the toilers at the machines where she herself labored
so many years ago; it means release for stenographers, bookkeepers,
clerks, in the general office without; but for her, there yet remain
many things to be attended to before she can take advantage of the half
holiday and seek the seclusion of her small suburban home. Important
letters must be written, private letters which cannot be entrusted to
the care of an ordinary stenogr