it."

"Tell me what you want," said Katherine.

"Are you sure the story is genuine?" asked Miss Payne.

"I am quite sure. I went into Bow Street Police Court to-day, intending
to speak to the sitting magistrate about some children respecting whom
he had asked for information, when I was attracted by the face of a
woman who was being examined; she was poorly clad, but evidently
respectable--like a better class of needle-woman. I never saw a face
express such despair. It seemed she had been caught in the act of
stealing two loaves from the shop of a baker. The poor creature did not
deny it. Her story was that she had been for some years a widow; that
she had supported herself and two children by needle-work and
machine-work. Illness had impoverished her and diminished her
connection, other workers having been taken on in her absence. In short
she had been caught in that terrible maelstrom of misfortune from which
_no_ one can escape without a helping hand. Her sewing machine was
seized for rent; one article after another of furniture and clothes went
for food; at last nothing was left. She roamed the city, reduced to beg
at last, and striving to make up her mind to go to the workhouse, the
cry of the hungry children she had left in her ears. At several bakers'
shops she had petitioned for food and had been refused. At last,
entering one while the shop-girl's back was turned, she snatched a
couple of small loaves and rushed out into the arms of a policeman, who
had seen the theft through the window."

"And would the magistrate punish her for this?" asked Katherine,
eagerly.

"He must. Theft is theft, whatever the circumstances that seem to
extenuate it. Nothing, no need, gives a right to take what does not
belong to you. But, for all that, I am certain the poor creature has
been honest hitherto, and deserves help. She is committed to prison for
stealing, and I promised her I would look to her children; so I have
been to see them, and took them to the Children's Refuge that you were
kind enough to subscribe to, Miss Liddell. To-morrow we must do what we
can for the mother. I imagine it is worse than death to her to be put in
prison."

"I do not wonder at it," ejaculated Miss Payne. "And in spite of what
you say, Bertie, I should not like to give any materials to be made up
by a woman who deliberately stole in broad daylight."

"I do not see that the light made any difference," returned Bertie; and
they plunged into