s. It
was all she could do to keep it from slipping from her arms, or jumping
out over them. The uncertainty of what its next move would be caused her
to clutch it so tightly that her muscles and nerves were at a tension, and
she was glad to put it down on the cape also. The mother, with her eyes
open wide at this unexpected goodness of strangers, was close at her
heels.

"It's her sleeping time," she explained. "That's what makes her fret so."

"Will she eat a piece of orange?" asked Elizabeth, preparing to remove the
rind.

"I don't know but what she will."

Elizabeth held it out. The baby knew whether she would or not. Instantly
her fingers closed about it, and carried it to her mouth. It was only a
few moments until the eyes closed and the child was fast asleep with the
bit of orange tight in her hand.

"Your husband works at Italee?" asked the woman of the child's mother, as
she was arranging her lunch for them.

"Yes'm, he works in the brickyard there. We hain't been there long. I was
just up home buryin' my mother."

"What is your husband's name?"

"Koons--Sam Koons. He's a molder. They pay pretty well there. That's why
we moved. He used to work up at Keating; but it seemed like we'd do better
down here."

"There's no brickyard at Keating?"

"No; but there's mines. Sam, he's a miner, but he's takin' up the brick
trade."

"Yes; I see. I do not wonder that you were glad to leave Keating. It
surely is a rough place. I have never known a town so reeking with liquor.
There's every inducement there for a man's going wrong, and none for his
going right."

"Yes'm," said Mrs. Koons. Her deprecatory, worried expression showed that
she appreciated the disadvantages of the place. "That's what I've always
told Sam," she continued in her apologetic, meek voice. "When a man's
trying to do his best and keep sober, there's them what would come right
in his house and ask him to drink. A man may be meanin' well, and tryin'
to do what's right, but when the drink's in his blood, and there's them
what's coaxin' him to it, it hain't much wonder that he gives up. Sam,
he's one of the biggest-hearted men, and a good miner, but he's no man for
standin' his ground. He's easy-like to lead. We heard there wasn't no
drinkin' places about Italee--they wasn't allowed--so we come."

"Yes; I've heard that Mr. Gleason tried to keep the place free from
drink."

"Yes'm, but folks down there say that the Senator don't have much to