ran down the steps. As she did so she was surprised to meet several
young men and women ascending them. Surely they could not all belong
to Miss Kendall's dramatic troupe, she reflected, as she hurried away.

John was in his room and alone, and when he heard Elizabeth's news he
caught her round the waist and danced about until Mrs. Dalley sent up
by one of her maids to inquire if them young men didn't care if the
plaster in the ceiling below all fell down? The dancers collapsed
joyously upon the sofa, and Elizabeth, looking at John's glowing face,
felt what happiness might be hers one day if she had wealth enough to
help her family to their desires.

"This is the bulliest thing that ever happened," cried John boyishly.
"Say, he thinks all manner of things about you, Lizzie, I can see."

Elizabeth blushed. "Nonsense. It's your profound learning and great
medical skill that attracted him."

"When did he tell you?"

"Just this afternoon. I was going to the church to a committee meeting
of Miss Kendall's--the church caller, John, just think, haven't I the
courage of a V. C.?--and he walked there with me--and oh, John, we came
through Newton Street, and it's an awful place. I never dreamed there
was such poverty right near us. Isn't it wicked to eat three meals a
day and be well dressed, when people are starving right at one's door?"

"I suppose some of those poor beggars do have a kind of slim diet, but
it's half their own fault. Don't you go and get batty over them, now.
Mac has it so bad I can't stand another."

"Stuart? What about him?"

"He's got into some kind of mission business down in that hole; but
don't tell him I let it out. He's the kind that would cut his right
hand off if it hinted its doings to his left hand."

"Why, what does he do there?" Elizabeth's voice had a wistful note.
This was just what she should have been doing, but Charles Stuart had
never appealed to her for help. He knew better, she told herself, with
some bitterness.

"Oh, all sorts of stunts--boys' club and Sunday school; everything from
nursing babies to hammering drunks that abuse their wives. He keeps me
and old Bagsley humping, too. It's good practice, but the pay's all
glory. Bags has about a dozen patients down there now."

Elizabeth was silent; that old, old feeling of despair that used to
come over her when John and Charles Stuart disappeared down the lane,
leaving her far behind, was stealing over her. Th