ffering to sit down.

Not even the defendant's youth and beauty and (seeming) timidity were
able to modify my savagery, for a time--and meantime question and answer
were going on. She had risen to her feet with the first question; and
there she stood, with her pretty face bent floorward whilst I inquired,
but always with her honest eyes looking me in the face when it came her
turn to answer.

And this was her tale, and her plea-diffidently stated, but
straight-forwardly; and bravely, and most winningly simply and
earnestly: I put it in my own fashion, for I do not remember her words:

Mr. Karl Gerhardt, who works in Pratt & Whitney's machine shops, has
made a statue in clay, and would I be so kind as to come and look at it,
and tell him if there is any promise in it? He has none to go to, and he
would be so glad.

"O, dear me," I said, "I don't know anything about art--there's nothing
I could tell him."

But she went on, just as earnestly and as simply as before, with her
plea--and so she did after repeated rebuffs; and dull as I am, even
I began by and by to admire this brave and gentle persistence, and to
perceive how her heart of hearts was in this thing, and how she couldn't
give it up, but must carry her point. So at last I wavered, and
promised in general terms that I would come down the first day that fell
idle--and as I conducted her to the door, I tamed more and more,
and said I would come during the very next week--"We shall be so
glad--but--but, would you please come early in the week?--the statue
is just finished and we are so anxious--and--and--we did hope you could
come this week--and"--well, I came down another peg, and said I would
come Monday, as sure as death; and before I got to the dining room
remorse was doing its work and I was saying to myself, "Damnation, how
can a man be such a hound? why didn't I go with her now?" Yes, and how
mean I should have felt if I had known that out of her poverty she had
hired a hack and brought it along to convey me. But luckily for what was
left of my peace of mind, I didn't know that.

Well, it appears that from here she went to Charley Warner's. There was
a better light, there, and the eloquence of her face had a better chance
to do its office. Warner fought, as I had done; and he was in the midst
of an article and very busy; but no matter, she won him completely.
He laid aside his MS and said, "Come, let us go and see your father's
statue. That is--is he yo