ned. A thin, angular woman
stood there, her dark hair streaked with gray, and Willa glanced at
her, then swiftly averted her gaze in pity. The face before her was
drawn and scarred as if the hot hand of wrath had clawed it, searing
and distorting it to the hideous, grinning semblance of a mask.

"I beg your pardon." Willa's voice was very gentle. "I am looking for
someone known as Klondike Kate. If you are she, I have a great favor
to ask of you."

She had sounded the right note; the woman, who for so long had been the
recipient of grudging, half-contemptuous favor herself, gasped and
flung wide the door.

"Come in, Miss. I'm Kate, right enough. Sit down close to the stove;
I ain't got much of a fire." The voice was singularly clear and sweet.

Willa glanced about her and then back at the woman who had dropped into
a low rocker beside a table heaped with red flannels, which she had
evidently been mending. The room was tiny and pitifully bare, but
scrubbed clean, and pathetic bows of faded ribbon strove to conceal the
worn spots on the coarse snowy curtains. A small pot bubbled on the
stove and two cold potatoes and half a stale loaf on the shelf betrayed
the meagerness of the larder.

The woman had given an impression of age at first, but Willa saw now
that she could be scarcely more than forty and her eyes were rather
fine despite their hint of tragedy.

"I'm looking for someone who can tell me about Violet, the girl who
used to dance at Jake's." Willa chose her words deliberately. "Mr.
Ryder says you were a friend of hers, years ago."

"Bill Ryder said that?" Klondike Kate drew a deep breath. "A friend?
She was the best friend a body could ever have! But you could hardly
have known her; she died fifteen years past."

"I know. I was wondering if you knew her story; if she left any papers
with you?"

"Who are you?" the woman asked suddenly, bending forward. "If I knew
Vi's story, would I repay her for all her kindness by telling it to a
stranger? Why should I show you her papers if she did leave any with
me, when that lawyer could get nothing out of me two years ago, for all
his blustering?"

"Would you do it if you could help her baby to claim what is her own?"
Willa asked earnestly. "My name is Abercrombie, but I happen to know
that the girl your friend left behind her is trying to prove her
identity. I thought that you would want to help."

"Oh, if I could!" Klondike Kate clasped he