ting on a doorstep, weeping bitterly.

This woman--hardly more than a girl--was holding a little bundle in one
hand. The other covered her face. Her sobs were audible. Grief of the
most intense, he saw at once, convulsed her. Two or three by-standers,
watching with a kind of pleased curiosity, completed the scene, most
sordid in its setting, there under the flicker of a gas-light on the
corner.

"Hm! What now?" thought Gabriel, stopping to watch the little tragedy.
"More trouble, eh? It's trouble all up and down the line, for these poor
devils! Nothing but trouble for the slave-class. Well, well, let's see
what's wrong _now_!"

Gabriel turned down the alley, drew near the little group, and halted.

"What's wrong?" he asked, in the tone of authority he knew how to use;
the tone which always overbore his outward aspect, even though he might
have been clad in rags; the tone which made men yield to him, and women
look at him with trustful eyes, even as the Billionaire's daughter had
looked.

"Search _me_!" murmured one of the men, shrugging his shoulders. "_I_
can't git nothin' out o' her. She's been sittin' here, cryin', a few
minutes, that's all I know; an' she won't say nothin' to nobody.

"Any of you men know anything about it?" demanded Gabriel, looking at
the rest.

A murmur of negation was his only answer. One or two others, scenting
some excitement, even though only that of a distressed woman--common
sight, indeed!--lingered near. The little group was growing.

Gabriel bent and touched the woman's shoulder.

"What's the matter?" asked he, in a gentle voice. "If you're in trouble,
let me help you."

Renewed sobs were her only answer.

"If you'll only tell me what's the matter," Gabriel went on, "I'm sure
I can do something for you."

"You--you can't!" choked the woman, without raising her head from the
corner of the ragged shawl that she was holding over her eyes. "Nobody
can't! Bill, he's gone, and Eddy's gone, and Mr. Micolo says he won't
let me in. So there ain't nothin' to do. Let me alone--oh dear, oh dear,
dear!"

Fresh tears and grief. The little knot of spectators, still growing,
nodded with approval, and figuratively licked its lips, in satisfaction.
Somewhere a boy snickered.

"Come, come," said Gabriel, bending close over the grief-stricken woman,
"pull together, and let's hear what the trouble is! Who's Bill, and
who's Eddy--and what about Mr. Micolo? Come, tell me. I'm sure I can do
so