h
a drum as to collect flies round a lump of sugar,--men will always
come buzzing about where there is any excitement. The question is,
Have you got the fly-paper to make 'em stick?"

At Nepaug Nora had smiled at Miss Standish's blunt questions; but
here, in the depression of spirits caused by overwork and the deadened
atmosphere, the words came back to her with overwhelming force. When
she rose on the morning after seeing Flint standing in the window at
Delmonico's, she found more than one importunate question arising in
her mind. Was it worth while after all--the sacrifice she was making,
the work, the worry, and above all the contact with so much that
offended her taste and judgment?

Were not those people behind the curtains, with their purple and fine
linen, more nearly right than she? They at least found and gave
pleasure for the moment--while she--? Then there swept over her the
recollection of the drunkard who had shouted loudest in the hallelujah
chorus and reeled home drunk after the meeting, of the penitent girl
whom she had seen one night dissolved in tears, the next out on the
streets again at her old calling,--"Yes," she admitted sadly, "Miss
Standish is right. It is one thing to catch them, but another to keep
them." If it had been only the sinners, she would not have minded so
much, but there were some things about her fellow-officers-- Here
she stopped, for her loyalty would not allow her to go on, even in
thought. This mood of depression was not an uncommon thing in Nora
Costello's life, but she sought the antidote in prayer and work.

After her morning devotions, she spent an hour in setting her room to
rights; watering the plants on the window-sill, feeding the bird in
the cage, and then, after a breakfast of the most frugal sort, she
started on her way to her post. Although it was not yet eight o'clock
when she emerged from the door of the tenement-house where she lodged,
a haze of heat hung over the city like a pall, the sun was already
beating with a sickening glare upon the sidewalk, which still showed
signs of having been made a sleeping place by those who found their
crowded quarters within too suffocating for endurance. On the
doorstep, worn with the feet of the frequent passers, sat a weary
woman, nursing her baby. Nora's heart sank as she noticed the deathly
pallor of the little thing. She stopped, bent over, and listened to
its breathing. Then she lifted the eyelid streaked with blue, an