t
yet seemed to be moving beside him, touching his soul, breathing upon
him! He was so engrossed with this thought that it never occurred to him
that he had given the old woman every cent he had in his pocket. He had
forgotten entirely that he had been hungry. A great world-wonder was
moving within his spirit. He could not understand himself. He went back
with awe over the last few minutes and the strange new world into which
he had been so suddenly plunged.

Scarcely noticing how he went, he got himself out of the intricacies of
the court into a neighborhood a shade less poverty-stricken, and stood
upon the corner of a busy thoroughfare in an utterly unfamiliar
district, pausing to look about him and discover his whereabouts.

A little child with long, fair hair rushed suddenly out of a door on the
side-street, eagerly pulling a ragged sweater about his small shoulders,
and stood upon the curbstone, breathlessly watching the coming trolley.
The car stopped, and a young girl in shabby clothes got out and came
toward him.

"Bonnie! Bonnie! I've got supper all ready!" the child called in a
clear, bird-like voice, and darted from the curb across the narrow
side-street to meet her.

Courtland, standing on the corner in front of the trolley, saw, too
late, the swift-coming automobile bearing down upon the child, its
head-lights flaring on the golden hair. With a cry the young man sprang
to the rescue, but the child was already crumpled up like a lily and the
relentless car speeding onward, its chauffeur darting frightened,
cowardly glances behind him as he plunged his machine forward over the
track, almost in the teeth of the up-trolley. When the trolley was
passed there was no sign of the car, even if any one had had time to
look for it. There in the road lay the little, broken child, the long
hair spilling like gold over the pavement, the little, still, white face
looking up like a flower that has suddenly been torn from the plant.

The girl was beside the child almost instantly, dropping all her
parcels; gathering him into her slender arms, calling in frightened,
tender tones:

"Aleck! Darling! My little darling!"

The child was too heavy for her to lift, and she tottered as she tried
to rise, lifting a frightened face to Courtland.

"Let me take him," said the young man, stooping and gathering him gently
from her. "Now show me where!"

CHAPTER VI

Into the narrow brick house from which he had run for