could out of living.

Sidney, suddenly practical, broke in on his thoughts:--

"Where are you going to get your meals?"

"I hadn't thought about it. I can stop in somewhere on my way downtown.
I work in the gas office--I don't believe I told you. It's rather
haphazard--not the gas office, but the eating. However, it's
convenient."

"It's very bad for you," said Sidney, with decision. "It leads to
slovenly habits, such as going without when you're in a hurry, and that
sort of thing. The only thing is to have some one expecting you at a
certain time."

"It sounds like marriage." He was lazily amused.

"It sounds like Mrs. McKee's boarding-house at the corner. Twenty-one
meals for five dollars, and a ticket to punch. Tillie, the dining-room
girl, punches for every meal you get. If you miss any meals, your ticket
is good until it is punched. But Mrs. McKee doesn't like it if you
miss."

"Mrs. McKee for me," said Le Moyne. "I daresay, if I know
that--er--Tillie is waiting with the punch, I'll be fairly regular to my
meals."

It was growing late. The Street, which mistrusted night air, even on a
hot summer evening, was closing its windows. Reginald, having eaten
his fill, had cuddled in the warm hollow of Sidney's lap, and slept.
By shifting his position, the man was able to see the girl's face. Very
lovely it was, he thought. Very pure, almost radiant--and young. From
the middle age of his almost thirty years, she was a child. There had
been a boy in the shadows when he came up the Street. Of course there
would be a boy--a nice, clear-eyed chap--

Sidney was looking at the moon. With that dreamer's part of her that she
had inherited from her dead and gone father, she was quietly worshiping
the night. But her busy brain was working, too,--the practical brain
that she had got from her mother's side.

"What about your washing?" she inquired unexpectedly.

K. Le Moyne, who had built a wall between himself and the world, had
already married her to the youth of the shadows, and was feeling an odd
sense of loss.

"Washing?"

"I suppose you've been sending things to the laundry, and--what do you
do about your stockings?"

"Buy cheap ones and throw 'em away when they're worn out." There seemed
to be no reserve with this surprising young person.

"And buttons?"

"Use safety-pins. When they're closed one can button over them as well
as--"

"I think," said Sidney, "that it is quite time some one took a little
ca