rson
more erect, and shook herself like a wild beast aroused from inaction.

Pinky was too blind to see the change that had come so suddenly. A
stinging retort fell from her lips. But the words had scarcely died on
the air ere she found herself in the grip of vice-like hands. Resistance
was of no more avail than if she had been a child. In what seemed but a
moment of time she was pushed back through the door and dropped upon the
pavement. Then the door shut, and she was alone on the outside--no,
not alone, for scores of the denizens who huddle together in that foul
region were abroad, and gathered around her as quickly as flies about
a heap of offal, curious, insolent and aggressive. As she arose to her
feet she found herself hemmed in by a jeering crowd.

"Ho! it's Pinky Swett!" cried a girl, pressing toward her. "Hi, Pinky!
what's the matter? What's up?"

"Norah pitched her out! I saw it!" screamed a boy, one of the young
thieves that harbored in the quarter.

"It's a lie!" Pinky answered back as she confronted the crowd.

At this moment another boy, who had come up behind Pinky, gave her dress
so violent a jerk that she fell over backward on the pavement, striking
her head on a stone and cutting it badly. She lay there, unable to rise,
the crowd laughing with as much enjoyment as if witnessing a dog-fight.

"Give her a dose of mud!" shouted one of the boys; and almost as soon
as the words were out of his mouth her face was covered with a paste of
filthy dirt from the gutter. This, instead of exciting pity, only gave
a keener zest to the show. The street rang with shouts and peals of
merriment, bringing a new and larger crowd to see the fun. With them
came one or two policemen.

Seeing that it was only a drunken woman, they pushed back the crowd and
raised her to her feet. As they did so the blood streamed from the back
of her head and stained her dress to the waist. She was taken to the
nearest station-house.

At eleven o'clock on the next morning, punctual to the minute, came Mrs.
Dinneford to the little third-story room in which she had met Mrs. Bray.
She repeated her rap at the door before it was opened, and noticed that
a key was turned in the lock.

"You have seen the woman?" she said as she took an offered seat, coming
at once to the object of her visit.

"Yes."

"Well?"

"I gave her the money."

"Well?"

Mrs. Bray shook her head:

"Afraid I can't do much with her."

"Why?" an anxious expr