er appearance was that of one who had been profoundly startled.

"Why don't some one answer me?" she asked, after an instant's pause,
seemingly unconscious that, alike to those who knew her and to those
who did not, her air and manner were such as to naturally impose
silence. "Must I go into the house in order to find out if this good
woman is dead or not?"

"Shure she isn't dead yet," spoke up a brawny butcher-boy, bolder than
the rest. "But she's sore hurt, miss, and the doctors say as how there
is no hope."

A change impossible to understand passed over the girl's face. Had she
been less vigorous of body, she would have staggered. As it was, she
stood still, rigidly still, and seemed to summon up her faculties, till
the very clinch of her fingers spoke of the strong control she was
putting upon herself.

"It is dreadful, dreadful!" she murmured, this time in a whisper, and as
if to some rising protest in her own soul. "No good can come of it,
none." Then, as if awakening to the scene about her, shook her head and
cried to those nearest: "It was a tramp who did it, I suppose; at least,
I am told so."

"A tramp has been took up, miss, on suspicion, as they call it."

"If a tramp has been taken up on suspicion, then he was the one who
assailed her, of course." And pushing on through the crowd that fell
back still more awe-struck than before, she went into the house.

The murmur that followed her was subdued but universal. It made no
impression on Mr. Byrd. He had leaned forward to watch the girl's
retreating form, but, finding his view intercepted by the wrinkled
profile of an old crone who had leaned forward too, had drawn
impatiently back. Something in that crone's aged face made him address
her.

"You know the lady?" he inquired.

"Yes," was the cautious reply, given, however, with a leer he found not
altogether pleasant.

"She is a relative of the injured woman, or a friend, perhaps?"

The old woman's face looked frightful.

"No," she muttered grimly; "they are strangers."

At this unexpected response Mr. Byrd made a perceptible start forward.
The old woman's hand fell at once on his arm.

"Stay!" she hoarsely whispered. "By strangers I mean they don't visit
each other. The town is too small for any of us to be strangers."

Mr. Byrd nodded and escaped her clutch.

"This is worth seeing through," he murmured, with the first gleam of
interest he had shown in the affair. And, hurrying forward, he su