t with children, and
catching the little fellow up, he soothed and fondled him and finally
brought him with such a merry air of triumph straight to his mother's
arms, that confidence between them was immediately established and
conversation started.

He had in his pocket an ingenious little invention which he had exhibited
all along the road as an indispensable article in every well-kept house.
He wanted to show it to her, but it was too cold a day for her to stop
outside. Wouldn't she allow him to step in and explain how her work could
be materially lessened and her labour turned to play by a contrivance so
simple that a child could run it?

It was all so ridiculous in face of this woman's quiet intelligence, that
he laughed at his own words, and this laughter, echoed by the child and
in another instant by the mother, made everything so pleasant for the
moment that she insensibly drew back while he pulled open the gate, only
remarking, as she led the way in:

"I was looking for my husband. He may come any minute and I'm afraid he
won't care much about contrivances to save me work--that is, if they cost
very much."

Sweetwater, whose hand was in his pocket, drew it hastily out.

"You were watching for your husband? Do you often stand in the open
doorway, looking for him?"

Her surprised eyes met his with a stare that would have embarrassed the
most venturesome book agent, but this man was of another ilk.

"If you do," he went on imperturbably, but with a good-humoured smile
which deepened her favourable impression of him, "how much I would give
if you had been standing there last Tuesday night when a certain cutter
and horse went by on its way up the hill."

She was a self-contained woman, this wife of a master mechanic in one of
the great shops hard by; but her jaw fell at this, and she forgot to
chide or resist her child when he began to pull her towards the open
kitchen door.

Sweetwater, sensitive to the least change in the human face, prayed that
the husband might be detained, if only for five minutes longer, while he,
Sweetwater, worked this promising mine.

"You _were_ looking out," he ventured. "And you _did_ see that horse and
cutter. What luck! It may save a man's life."

"Save!" she repeated, staggering back a few steps and dragging the child
with her. "Save a man's life! What do you mean by that?"

"Not much if it was any cutter and any horse, and at any hour. But if it
was the horse and cutte