ure of a tall, timid, stooping man in an old-fashioned
cape, such as no Comstock boy had ever seen on anything masculine.

"It's Professor Trask," breathed Irene, keen delight in persecution
lending to her aggressive, bright face that savage sharpness of feature
which Sissy Madigan called Indian. "Don't you wish you hadn't got that
dress on, Jack?" she asked, as the tall, black mark for a good shot
still stood hesitating to cross the polished, steep street, down which
many sleds had slipped for days past. "You could get him every time,
couldn't you?"

Despite the ignoble garment that cramped it, the boy's breast swelled
with pride in his lady's approval.

"You could just fire one at him from here, anyway," suggested Irene,
adaptable as her sex is to contemporary standards and customs.

"Ye-es," said the boy, hesitating; "but he's such a poor old luny."

Split turned her imperial little hooded head questioningly.

[Illustration:
"They had coasted only half a block"]

"He is--really luny," said the boy, apologetically. "Since his little
girl wandered away one day from home and never came back, he gets
spells, you know. He was telling ma one day when she went over to do his
washing. But--but I will land one on him if you want, Split."

But Split had suddenly pivoted clear around and sat now facing him, an
eager, mittened hand staying his hard, skilful, obedient fingers,
already making the snowball.

"How--how old would that little girl be, Jack?" she gasped.

"Why, 'bout twelve--thirteen. Why?"

"And what would be the color of her hair?"

"Red, I s'pose, like his; not--not like yours--Split," he added shyly,
glancing at the brown fire of the curls that escaped from her hood.

But Irene was no longer listening. She was looking over to the other
side of the street, where that shrinking, pitiable old figure in its
threadbare neatness trembled; not daring to seek safety across the
dangerously smooth street, nor daring to remain exposed here, where it
ducked ridiculously every now and then to avoid the whizzing balls that
sang about it.

Irene breathed hard. A coward for a father, a scarecrow, a butt for a
gang of miners' boys! This, this was her father! Why, even crippled old
Jim, the wood-chopper, seen in retrospect and haloed by copper-colored
dreams of romantic rehabilitation--even Jim seemed regrettable.

But she did not hesitate, any more than Fedalma did. She, too, knew a
daughter's duty--to a