howed him two children--a boy of seven and
a girl of five--sitting on the floor, which was further littered by
a mattress, pillow, and blanket. There was a cheap tray on one of the
trunks containing two soiled plates and cups and fragments of a meal.
But there was neither a chair nor table nor any other article of
furniture in the room. Yet he was struck by the fact that, in spite of
this poverty of surrounding, the children were decently dressed, and the
few scattered pieces of luggage in quality bespoke a superior condition.

The children met his astonished stare with an equal wonder and, he
fancied, some little fright. The boy's lips trembled a little as he said
apologetically--

"I told Jinny not to sing. But she didn't make MUCH noise."

"Mamma said I could play with my dolly. But I fordot and singed," said
the little girl penitently.

"Where's your mamma?" asked the young man. The fancy of their being
near relatives of the night watchman had vanished at the sound of their
voices.

"Dorn out," said the girl.

"When did she go out?"

"Last night."

"Were you all alone here last night?"

"Yes!"

Perhaps they saw the look of indignation and pity in the editor's face,
for the boy said quickly--

"She don't go out EVERY night; last night she went to"--

He stopped suddenly, and both children looked at each other with a half
laugh and half cry, and then repeated in hopeless unison, "She's dorn
out."

"When is she coming back again?"

"To-night. But we won't make any more noise."

"Who brings you your food?" continued the editor, looking at the tray.

"Woberts."

Evidently Roberts, the night watchman! The editor felt relieved; here
was a clue to some explanation. He instantly sat down on the floor
between them.

"So that was the dolly that slept in my bed," he said gayly, taking it
up.

God gives helplessness a wonderful intuition of its friends. The
children looked up at the face of their grown-up companion, giggled, and
then burst into a shrill fit of laughter. He felt that it was the first
one they had really indulged in for many days. Nevertheless he said,
"Hush!" confidentially; why he scarcely knew, except to intimate to them
that he had taken in their situation thoroughly. "Make no noise," he
added softly, "and come into my big room."

They hung back, however, with frightened yet longing eyes. "Mamma said
we mussent do out of this room," said the girl.

"Not ALONE," responded the edito