ds and walks led sinuously and invitingly
underneath the shade. Through the trees upon the other side of a wide
expanse of turf, brown and sear under the summer sun, she caught a
glimpse of tall buildings and a flagstaff. The whole place had a vaguely
public, educational appearance, and Minna guessed, from certain notices
affixed to the trees, warning the public against the picking of flowers,
that she had found her way into the grounds of the State University. She
went on a little further. The path she was following led her, at length,
into a grove of gigantic live oaks, whose lower branches all but swept
the ground. Here the grass was green, the few flowers in bloom, the
shade very thick. A more lovely spot she had seldom seen. Near at hand
was a bench, built around the trunk of the largest live oak, and here,
at length, weak from hunger, exhausted to the limits of her endurance,
despairing, abandoned, Minna Hooven sat down to enquire of herself what
next she could do.

But once seated, the demands of the animal--so she could believe--became
more clamorous, more insistent. To eat, to rest, to be safely housed
against another night, above all else, these were the things she craved;
and the craving within her grew so mighty that she crisped her poor,
starved hands into little fists, in an agony of desire, while the tears
ran from her eyes, and the sobs rose thick from her breast and struggled
and strangled in her aching throat.

But in a few moments Minna was aware that a woman, apparently of some
thirty years of age, had twice passed along the walk in front of the
bench where she sat, and now, as she took more notice of her, she
remembered that she had seen her on the ferry-boat coming over from the
city.

The woman was gowned in silk, tightly corseted, and wore a hat of rather
ostentatious smartness. Minna became convinced that the person was
watching her, but before she had a chance to act upon this conviction
she was surprised out of all countenance by the stranger coming up to
where she sat and speaking to her.

"Here is a coincidence," exclaimed the new-comer, as she sat down;
"surely you are the young girl who sat opposite me on the boat. Strange
I should come across you again. I've had you in mind ever since."

On this nearer view Minna observed that the woman's face bore
rather more than a trace of enamel and that the atmosphere about was
impregnated with sachet. She was not otherwise conspicuous, but ther