ould do for you."

She shook her head. Her little painted face looked pinched. There
were shadows under the eyes that should have been soft and dewy.
"You can't do nothin'. I'll tell you why. Somehow--I--I'd like you
to know."

And she sat there and told him.

"You see?" said she, when she had finished.

"I see," said Peter; and the hand that held his cigarette trembled.
The thing that struck him most forcibly was the stupid waste of it
all.

"Look here, Gracie," he said at last, "if you ever get--very
unlucky--and things are too hard for you--sort of last ditch, you
know,--I want you to go to a certain address. It's to my uncle," he
explained, seeing her look blank. "You'll send in the card I'm going
to give you, and you will say I sent you. He'll probably investigate
you, you know. But you just tell him the truth, and say I told you
he'd help. Will you do that!"

She in her turn reflected, watching Peter curiously. Then she fell
to tracing patterns on the table-cloth with the point of her knife.

"All right," she said. "If ever I have to, an' I can find him, I
will--an' say you sent me."

Peter took out his pocket memorandum, wrote his uncle's name and the
address of the house in the Seventies which he was presently to
occupy, added, "I wish you'd do what you can, for my sake," and
signed it. He handed the girl the slip of paper, and she thrust it
into her low-necked blouse.

"And now," he finished kindly, "you'd better go home, Gracie, go to
bed, and sleep." He held out his brown hand, and she, rising from
her chair, gripped his fingers as a child might have done, and
looked at him with dog's eyes.

"Good-by!" said she, huskily. "You _are_ real, ain't you?"

"Damnably so," admitted Peter. "Good-by, then, Gracie." And he left
her standing by the table, the empty wine-glass before her. The
streets stretched before him emptily.--That poor, done-for kid! What
_is_ one to do for these Gracies?

"Mister! For God's sake! I'm hungry!" a hoarse voice accosted him. A
dirty hand was held out.

Mechanically Peter's hand went to his pocket, found a silver dollar,
and held it out. The dirty hand snatched it, and without so much as
a thank you the man rushed into a near-by bakery. Peter shuddered.

When he reached his room, he sat for a long time before his open
window, and stared at the myriads and myriads of lights. From the
streets far below came a subdued, ceaseless drone, as if the huge
city stirred uneasil