queezing it tightly. "I--I wish I might help
you."

"Ye can't, Miss. There ain't nothin' can be done for us--'nless the
good Lord would take us all," and there was utter hopelessness and
desperation in her voice.

"Don't say that! It must be that there are better times in store for
you all," said Janice.

"With _that_?" asked Mrs. Narnay, nodding her uncombed head toward the
sleeping drunkard. "Not much. Only for baby, here. There's a better
time comin' for her--thanks be!"

"Oh!"

"Doctor says she can't live out th' Summer. She's goin' ter miss
growin' up ter be what _I_ be--an' what Sophie'll proberbly be. It's a
mercy. But it's hard ter part 'ith the little thing. When she is
bright, she's that cunnin'!"

As Janice came up the steps to sit down beside the poor woman and play
with the baby, that smiled at her so wanly, the sleeping man grunted,
rolled over toward them, half opened his eyes, and then rolled back
again.

Something rattled on the boards of the porch. Janice looked and saw
several small coins that had rolled out of the man's trousers pocket.
Mrs. Narnay saw them too.

"Git them, Sophie--quick!" she breathed peremptorily.

"Cheese it, Mom!" gasped Sophie, running on tiptoe toward her sleeping
father. "He'll nigh erbout kill us when he wakes up."

"I don't keer," said the woman, grabbing the coins when Sophie had
collected them. "He come out o' the woods last night and he had some
money an' I hadn't a cent. I sent him to git things from the store and
all he brought back--and that was at midnight when they turned him out
o' the hotel--was a bag of crackers and a pound of oatmeal. And he's
got money! He kin kill me if he wants. I'm goin' ter have some of
it--Oh, look! what's this?"

Janice had almost cried out in amazement, too. One of the coins in the
woman's toil-creased palm was a gold piece.

"Five dollars! Mebbe he had more," Mrs. Narnay said anxiously. "Mebbe
Concannon's paid 'em all some more money, and Jim's startin' in to
drink it up."

"Better put that money back, Mom, he'll be mad," said Sophie, evidently
much alarmed.

"He won't be ugly when the drink wears off and he ain't got no money to
git no more," her mother said. "Jim never is."

"But he'll find out youse got that gold coin. He's foxy," said the
shrewd child.

Janice drew forth her purse. "Let me have that five dollar gold
piece," she said to Mrs. Narnay. "I'll give you five one dollar bills
f