I
follow a beaten path--yes! a beaten path."

Helen was very curious about the old man's acquaintance with Fenwick
Grimes. The more she thought over her own interview with the money-lender
and mine-owner, the deeper became her suspicion that her father's one-time
partner was an untrustworthy man.

Anybody who seemed to know him better than _she_ did, naturally interested
Helen. Dud Stone had promised to find out all about Grimes, and Helen knew
that she would wait impatiently for his report.

But she was interested in Lurcher for his own miserable sake, too. He had
lived by himself in this wretched lodging for years. How he lived he did
not say; but it was evident that his income was both infinitesimal and
uncertain.

Nevertheless, he was not a mean-looking man, nor were his garments
unclean. They _were_ ragged. He admitted, apologetically, that he could
not see to use a needle and so "had sort o' got run down."

"I'll come some day soon and mend you up," promised Helen, when the old
man gave her the prescription he had received from the oculist at the Eye
and Ear Hospital. "And you shall have these glasses just as soon as the
lenses can be ground."

"God bless you, Miss!" said the old man, simply.

He had a quiet, "listening" face, and seldom spoke above a whisper. He was
more the shadow of a man than the substance.

"Ain't that a terrible end to look forward to, Helen?" remarked Sadie,
seriously, as they descended the stairs to the street. "He ain't got no
friends, and no family, and no way to make a decent livin'. They wouldn't
have the likes of him around in offices, writin' in books."

"Oh, you mean he is a bookkeeper?" cried Helen.

"Sure, I do. That's a business! My papa is going to be in business for
himself again. And so will I--you see! That's the only way to get on, and
lay up something for your old age. Work for yourself----"

"In a millinery store; eh?" suggested Helen, smiling.

"That's right!" declared Sadie, boldly.

"Where is the little store you spoke of? Do you suppose you can ever get
it, Sadie?"

"Don't! You make me feel bad here," said Sadie, with her hand on her
heart. "Say! I just _ache_ to try what I can do makin' lids for the East
Side Four Hundred. The wholesale houses let youse come there and work when
they're makin' up the season's pattern hats, and then you can get all the
new wrinkles. Oh, I wish I was goin' to start next season in me own store
instead of pullin' greenies