t forward. The
girl had written home and the home folks were coming. In his strange
way the Dummy knew that a change was near. The kaleidoscope would
shift again and the Avenue Girl would join the changing and
disappearing figures that fringed the inner circle of his heart.

One night he did not go to bed in the ward bed that was his only
home, beside the little stand that held his only possessions. The
watchman missed him and found him asleep in the chapel in one of the
seats, with the parrot drowsing on the altar.

Rose--who was the stout woman--came early. She wore a purple dress,
with a hat to match, and purple gloves. The ward eyed her with scorn
and a certain deference. She greeted the Avenue Girl effusively
behind the screens that surrounded the bed.

"Well, you do look pinched!" she said. "Ain't it a mercy it didn't
get to your face! Pretty well chewed up, aren't you?"

"Do you want to see it?"

"Good land! No! Now look here, you've got to put me wise or I'll
blow the whole thing. What's my little stunt? The purple's all right
for it, isn't it?"

"All you need to do," said the Avenue Girl wearily, "is to say that
I've been sewing for you since I came to the city. And--if you can
say anything good----"

"I'll do that all right," Rose affirmed. She put a heavy silver bag
on the bedside table and lowered herself into a chair. "You leave it
to me, dearie. There ain't anything I won't say."

The ward was watching with intense interest. Old Maggie, working the
creaking bandage machine, was palpitating with excitement. From her
chair by the door she could see the elevator and it was she who
announced the coming of destiny.

"Here comes the father," she confided to the end of the ward. "Guess
the mother couldn't come."

It was not the father though. It was a young man who hesitated in
the doorway, hat in hand--a tall young man, with a strong and not
unhandsome face. The Probationer, rather twitchy from excitement and
anxiety, felt her heart stop and race on again. Jerry, without a
doubt!

The meeting was rather constrained. The girl went whiter than her
pillows and half closed her eyes; but Rose, who would have been
terrified at the sight of an elderly farmer, was buoyantly relieved
and at her ease.

"I'm sorry," said Jerry. "I--we didn't realise it had been so bad.
The folks are well; but--I thought I'd better come. They're
expecting you back home."

"It was nice of you to come," said the girl, avoid