t for a beast, let alone a man?"

"No," answered a solemn voice behind. "No more did Tom, when you behaved
to him in the very same way."

It was Mrs. Bedonebyasyoudid. And, when the truncheon saw her, it
started bolt upright--Attention!--and made such a low bow, that if it
had not been full of the spirit of justice, it must have tumbled on its
end, and probably hurt its one eye. And Tom made his bow too.

"Oh, ma'am," he said, "don't think about me; that's all past and gone,
and good times and bad times and all times pass over. But may not I help
poor Mr. Grimes? Mayn't I try and get some of these bricks away, that he
may move his arms?"

"You may try, of course," she said.

So Tom pulled and tugged at the bricks: but he could not move one. And
then he tried to wipe Mr. Grimes' face: but the soot would not come off.

"Oh, dear!" he said. "I have come all this way, through all these
terrible places, to help you, and now I am of no use at all."

"You had best leave me alone," said Grimes; "you are a good-natured
forgiving little chap, and that's truth; but you'd best be off. The
hail's coming on soon, and it will beat the eyes out of your little
head."

"What hail?"

"Why, hail that falls every evening here; and, till it comes close to
me, it's like so much warm rain: but then it turns to hail over my head,
and knocks me about like small shot."

"That hail will never come any more," said the strange lady. "I have
told you before what it was. It was your mother's tears, those which
she shed when she prayed for you by her bedside; but your cold heart
froze it into hail. But she is gone to heaven now, and will weep no more
for her graceless son."

Then Grimes was silent awhile; and then he looked very sad.

"So my old mother's gone, and I never there to speak to her! Ah! a good
woman she was, and might have been a happy one, in her little school
there in Vendale, if it hadn't been for me and my bad ways."

"Did she keep the school in Vendale?" asked Tom. And then he told Grimes
all the story of his going to her house, and how she could not abide the
sight of a chimney-sweep, and then how kind she was, and how he turned
into a water-baby.

"Ah!" said Grimes, "good reason she had to hate the sight of a
chimney-sweep. I ran away from her and took up with the sweeps, and
never let her know where I was, nor sent her a penny to help her, and
now it's too late--too late!" said Mr. Grimes.

And he began crying and