o time to lose worryin'. You just read _that_."

Tilda produced and handed her scrap of paper to Mrs. Damper, who took
it, unfolded it, and perused the writing slowly.

"Goin' there?" she inquired at length.

"That depends." Tilda was not to be taken off her guard. "I want you to
read what it says."

"Yes, to be sure--I forgot what you said about havin' no schoolin'.
Well, it says: 'Arthur Miles, surname Chandon, b. Kingsand, May 1st,
1888. Rev. Dr. Purdie J. Glasson, Holy Innocents' Orphanage, Bursfield,
near Birmingham '--leastways, I can't read the last line clear, the
paper bein' frayed; but it's bound to be what I've said."

"Why?"

"Why, because that's the address. Holy Innocents, down by the canal--
I know it, o' course, _and_ Dr. Glasson. Damper supplied 'em with milk
for over six months, an' trouble enough we had to get our money."

"How far is it?"

"Matter of half a mile, I should say--close by the canal. You cross it
there by the iron bridge. The tram'll take you down for a penny, only
you must mind and get out this side of the bridge, because once you're
on the other side it's tuppence. Haven't got a penny? Well,"--Mrs.
Damper dived a hand into her till--"I'll give you one. Bein' a mother,
I can't bear to see children in trouble."

"Thank you," said Tilda. "It'll come in 'andy; but I ain't in no
trouble just yet."

"I 'spose," Mrs. Damper ventured after a pause, "you don't feel like
tellin' me what your business might be down at the orphanage? Not that
I'm curious.

"I can't." This was perfectly true, for she herself did not know.
"You see," she added with a fine air of mystery, "there's others mixed
up in this."

Mrs. Damper sighed.

"Well, I mustn' detain you . . . This Arthur Miles Chandon--he's not a
friend of yours by any chance?"

"He's a--sort of connection," said Tilda. "You know 'im, p'r'aps?"

"Dear me, no!"

"Oh,"--the child, without intending it, achieved a fine irony--
"I thought you seemed interested. Well, so long! and thank you again--
there's a tram stoppin' at the corner! Come along, 'Dolph!"

She was not--she had said it truthfully--by any means in trouble just
yet. On the contrary, after long deprivation she was tasting life
again, and finding it good. The streets of this Bursfield suburb were
far from suggestive of the New Jerusalem--a City of which, by the way,
Tilda had neither read nor heard. They were, in fact, mean and squalid,
begrimed wit