e them off, and Bob helped him. The
man tried to speak, but made hard work of it. Emotion choked him.

"Shure, an' I don't know what to make of it at all, at all," he said at
last, in a quivering voice. "Shure an' I thought the age of miracles was
passed. I'm only an ignorant old man, with no eyes at all; but you lads
have given me something that's near as good. Shure an' it's an old
sinner I am, for shure. Many's the day I've sat here, prayin' the Lord
would give me wan more minute o' sight before I died, an' it was
unanswered my prayers wuz, I thought. It's grateful I am to yez, lads.
It's old Adam McNulty's blessin' ye'll always have. An' now will yez put
them things in my ears? It's heaven's own angels I'd like to be hearin'
agin. That's the lad--ah!"

And while the beatific expression stole once more over his blind old
face the boys stole silently out.

CHAPTER X

THE ESCAPED CONVICT

The boys saw a good deal of Adam McNulty in the days that followed, and
the change in the old man was nothing short of miraculous.

He no longer sat in the bare kitchen rocking and smoking his pipe,
dependent upon some passer-by for his sole amusement. He had radio now,
and under the instruction of the boys he had become quite expert in
managing the apparatus. Although he had no eyes, his fingers were
extraordinarily sensitive and they soon learned to handle the set
intelligently.

His daughter Maggie, whose gratitude to the boys knew no bounds, looked
up the radio program in the paper each day and carefully instructed her
father as to just when the news reports were given out, the story
reading, concerts, and so forth.

And so the old blind man lived in a new world--or rather, the old world
which he had ceased to live in when he became blind--and he seemed
actually to grow younger day by day. For radio had become his eyes.

Doctor Dale heard of this act of kindness on the part of the boys and he
was warm in his praise.

"Radio," he told the boys one day when he met them on the street, "is a
wonderful thing for those of us that can see, but for the blind it is a
miracle. You boys have done an admirable thing in your kindness to Adam
McNulty, and I hope that, not only individuals, but the government
itself will see the possibilities of so great a charity and follow your
example."

The boys glowed with pride at the doctor's praise, and then and there
made the resolve that whenever they came across a blind person th