re
streaming down her own grimy cheeks. "She wouldn't be lost, would
she, if folks knew where she was? Nothin' ain't never lost when you
know where it is unless you drop it down a well, and you 'ain't got
no well, have you, Maria Edgham?"

"No," said Maria. She was conscious of an absurd thankfulness and
relief that she had no well.

"And there ain't no pond round here big enough to drown a baby
kitten, except that little mud-puddle up at Fisher's, and they've
dragged every inch of that. I see 'em."

All this time Edwin Shaw had been teetering on uncertain toes on the
borders of the crowd. He remembered the child with the doll whom he
had seen climbing into the New York train in the morning, and he was
eager to tell of it, to make himself of importance, but he was
afraid. After all, the child might not have been Evelyn. There were
so many little, yellow-haired things with dolls to be seen about, and
then there was the stout woman to be accounted for. Edwin never
doubted that the child had been with the stout woman whom he had seen
stumbling over her voluminous skirts up the car steps. At last he
stepped forward and spoke, with a moist blush overspreading his face,
toeing in and teetering with embarrassment.

"Say," he began.

The attention of the whole company was at once riveted upon him. He
wriggled; the blood looked as if it would burst through his face.
Great drops of perspiration stood upon his forehead. He stammered
when he spoke. He caught a glimpse of Maria's blue-and-orange
trimmings, and looked down, and again the black light of his shoes,
which all the dust of the day had not seemed to dim, flashed in his
eyes. He came of a rather illiterate family with aspirations, and
when he was nervous he had a habit of relapsing into the dialect in
common use in his own home, regardless of his educational
attainments. He did so now.

"I think she has went to New York," he said.

"Who?" demanded Wollaston, eagerly. His head was up like a hunting
hound; he kept close hold of Maria's little arm.

"Her."

"Who?"

"Her little sister-in-law." Edwin pointed to Maria.

Gladys Mann went peremptorily up to Edwin Shaw, seized his
coat-collar, and shook him. "For goodness sake! when did she went?"
she demanded. "When did you see her? If you know anythin', tell it,
an' not stand thar like a fool!"

"I saw a little girl jest about her size, a-carryin' of a doll, that
clim on the New York train jest as we went out thi