ll of
flaxseed unite to demoralize the man. O if Dr. Tarpion were only here!
But Davy will take no medicine; how could Tarpion help Davy?

Yes, that medicine--ipecac! The name has been hateful to Lockwin from
childhood.

Let Corkey win the primaries! What odds? Will not that release
Lockwin from the touching committees? Does he wish to owe his election
to a street car-company in another quarter of the city?

Perhaps Harpwood will win! How would that aid Davy? Ah, Davy! Davy!
all comes back to him! It is a strange influence this little boy has
thrown upon David Lockwin, child of fortune and people's idol.

It is a decent and wholesome thing---the only good and noble deed which
David Lockwin can just now credit to himself. He bathes his hot
forehead again.

Yes, Davy! Davy! Davy--the very thought of Davy restores the fallen
spirit. That water, too, seems to purify. Water and Davy! But it is
the well Davy--the little face framed at the window, waiting for papa,
waiting to know about Josephus--it is that Davy which stimulates the
soul.

Is it not a trial, then, to hear this boy--this rock of Lockwin's
better nature--in the grapple with Death himself?

If Davy were the flesh and blood of Lockwin, perhaps Lockwin might
determine that the child should follow its own wishes as to the taking
of ipecac. But this question of murder--this general feeling of
Chicago that its babes are slaughtered willfully--takes hold of the man
powerfully as he gathers his own scattered forces of life.

"Esther, will you not go to the rear chamber and sleep?"

The child appeals to her that her presence aids him.

"May I sit down here, Davy?"

There is a nod.

"Will you take some medicine now, Davy?"

"No, ma'am!" comes the gasping voice.

The man sprays with the stramonium. The doctor returns.

"Your boy is very ill with the asthma, Mr. Lockwin. He ought to be
relieved. But I think he will pull through. Do not allow your nerves
to be over-strained by the asthmatic respiration. It gives you more
pain than it gives to Davy."

"Do you suffer, Davy?"

"Yes, sir."

"Ah, well, he does not know what we mean. Get him to take the
medicine, Mr. Lockwin. It is your duty."

Duty! Alas! Is not David Lockwin responding to both love and duty
already? Is it not a response such as he did not believe he could make?

The doctor goes. The man works the rubber bulb until his fingers grow
paralytic. Esther sleeps fr