d, "to
put him to sleep for good and all? It ain't right to let a man suffer like
that! I can't stand it! I'm--I'm--" she broke off with a sob. Deborah put
one arm around her and held her steadily for a moment.

"The nurse will see that he sleeps," she said. "Now, John," she added,
presently, when the woman had gone into the room, "I want you to get your
things together. I'll have the janitor move them upstairs. You sleep there
to-night, and to-morrow morning come to see me at the school."

"All right, Miss Deborah, much obliged. I'll be all right. Good-night,
sir--"

"Good-night, my boy," said Roger, and suddenly he cleared his throat. He
followed his daughter down the stairs. A few minutes she talked with the
janitor, then joined her father in the court.

"I'm sorry I took you up there," she said. "I didn't know the man was
sick."

"Who are they?" he asked.

"Poor people," she said. And Roger flinched.

"Who is this boy?"

"A neighbor of theirs. His mother, who was a widow, died about two years
ago. He was left alone and scared to death lest he should be 'put away' in
some big institution. He got Mrs. Berry to take him in, and to earn his
board he began selling papers instead of coming to our school. So our
school visitor looked him up. Since then I have been paying his board from
a fund I have from friends uptown, and so he has finished his schooling.
He's to graduate next week. He means to be a stenographer."

"How old is he?"

"Seventeen," she replied.

"How was he crippled? Born that way?"

"No. When he was a baby his mother dropped him one Saturday night when she
was drunk. He has never been able to sit down. He can lie down or he can
stand. He's always in pain, it never stops. I learned that from the doctor
I took him to see. But whenever you ask him how he feels you get the same
answer always: 'Fine, thank you.' He's a fighter, is John."

"He looks it. I'd like to help that boy--"

"All right--you can help him," Deborah said. "You'll find him quite a
tonic."

"A what?"

"A tonic," she repeated. And with a sudden tightening of her wide and
sensitive mouth, Deborah added slowly, "Because, though I've known many
hungry boys, Johnny Geer is the hungriest of them all--hungry to get on in
life, to grow and learn and get good things, get friends, love, happiness,
everything!" As she spoke of this child in her family, over her strong
quiet face there swept a fierce, intent expression which struck R