is grief found utterance, and the
closing strains of the orchestra were mingled with a prolonged wail of
infinite sadness.

"Owgooste, what is ut?" cried his mother eyeing him with dawning
suspicion; then suddenly, "What haf you done? You haf ruin your new
Vauntleroy gostume!" Her face blazed; without more ado she smacked him
soundly. Then it was that Owgooste touched the limit of his misery,
his unhappiness, his horrible discomfort; his utter wretchedness was
complete. He filled the air with his doleful outcries. The more he was
smacked and shaken, the louder he wept.

"What--what is the matter?" inquired McTeague.

Trina's face was scarlet. "Nothing, nothing," she exclaimed hastily,
looking away. "Come, we must be going. It's about over." The end of the
show and the breaking up of the audience tided over the embarrassment of
the moment.

The party filed out at the tail end of the audience. Already the lights
were being extinguished and the ushers spreading druggeting over the
upholstered seats.

McTeague and the Sieppes took an uptown car that would bring them near
Polk Street. The car was crowded; McTeague and Owgooste were obliged to
stand. The little boy fretted to be taken in his mother's lap, but Mrs.
Sieppe emphatically refused.

On their way home they discussed the performance.

"I--I like best der yodlers."

"Ah, the soloist was the best--the lady who sang those sad songs."

"Wasn't--wasn't that magic lantern wonderful, where the figures moved?
Wonderful--ah, wonderful! And wasn't that first act funny, where the
fellow fell down all the time? And that musical act, and the fellow with
the burnt-cork face who played 'Nearer, My God, to Thee' on the beer
bottles."

They got off at Polk Street and walked up a block to the flat. The
street was dark and empty; opposite the flat, in the back of the
deserted market, the ducks and geese were calling persistently.

As they were buying their tamales from the half-breed Mexican at the
street corner, McTeague observed:

"Marcus ain't gone to bed yet. See, there's a light in his window.
There!" he exclaimed at once, "I forgot the doorkey. Well, Marcus can
let us in."

Hardly had he rung the bell at the street door of the flat when the
bolt was shot back. In the hall at the top of the long, narrow staircase
there was the sound of a great scurrying. Maria Macapa stood there,
her hand upon the rope that drew the bolt; Marcus was at her side;
Old Grannis was i