n put up with it so long."

"He was short of help, that's why. It isn't so easy to get new help in
the height of the summer season."

"That is true."

Joe expected to have more trouble with Sam Cullum the next day but it
did not come. Then it leaked out that Cullum had gotten into a row with
his wife and some of her relatives that night and was under arrest.
When the boatman was brought up for trial the Judge sentenced him to six
months' imprisonment.

"And it serves him right," said the man who brought the news to Joe.

"It must be hard on his wife."

"Well, it is, Joe."

"Have they any children?"

"Four--a boy of seven and three little girls."

"Are they well off?"

"What, with such a father? No, they are very poor. She used to go out
washing, but now she has to stay at home to take care of the baby. Sam
was a brute to strike her. I don't wonder the relatives took a hand."

"Perhaps the relatives can help her."

"They can't do much, for they are all as poor as she is, and one of them
is just getting over an operation at the hospital."

"Where do the Cullums live?"

"Down on Railroad Alley, not far from the water tower. It's a mite of a
cottage."

Joe said no more, but what he had been told him set him to thinking, and
that evening, after his work was over, he took a walk through the town
and in the direction of Railroad Alley.

Not far from the water station he found the Cullum homestead, a mite of
a cottage, as the man had said, with a tumbled-down chimney and several
broken-out windows. He looked in at one of the windows and by the light
of a smoking kerosene lamp beheld a woman in a rocking-chair, rocking a
baby to sleep. Three other youngsters were standing around, knowing not
what to do. On a table were some dishes, all bare of food.

"Mamma, I want more bread," one of the little ones was saying.

"You can have more in the morning, Johnny," answered the mother.

"No, I want it now," whimpered the youngster. "I'm hungry."

"I'm hungry, too," put in another little one.

"I can't give you any more to-night, for I haven't it," said the mother,
with a deep sigh. "Now, be still, or you'll wake the baby."

"Why don't dad come home?" asked the boy of seven.

"He can't come home, Bobby--he--had to go away," faltered the mother.
"Now all be still, and you shall have more bread in the morning."

The children began to cry, and unable to stand the sight any longer Joe
withdrew. Up the Alley was a