hindered needlessly, would you?"

A brilliant smile broke over the sharp little face upon the pillow.

"No, I wouldn't, and you don't. Well, here it is;" and very briefly,
but graphically, the alley vagrant sketched the story of his
acquaintance with Miss Armacost and his flight from her house.

The doctor listened without interruption till after the tale was done;
then he asked:

"How about that wandering melody of kindness, eh, my boy?"

"I don't know what you mean. I mean--I--I----"

Down in his warm heart Towsley did know, though he hated to
acknowledge it. He tried to justify himself in his own eyes as well as
in those of the good physician.

"She hadn't any right to take away my clothes. All the clothes I had.
She took away my name, too."

"Were they very good clothes, Towsley?"

"No. But they were _mine_!" fiercely.

"And the name. Is it a very honorable name, laddie?"

"It's just as honorable as I make it, sir! I needn't be an Alley boy
always, just because--because--nobody knows who my folks were."

"No, indeed. That you need not. That you will not be, for you've the
spirit to succeed. Only you need a little of the spirit of generosity,
too. The wandering melody again, you see. We can never quite get away
from it. Now, I'm going on my rounds through the wards. I'll stop in,
after an hour or so, and see if you have any errand for me to do.
Good-by. Take a nap, then think it over. I'll be back again."

Towsley didn't nap at all. He lay wide-eyed and full of thought,
staring at the white ceiling overhead, and occasionally touching a
pansy which nurse Brady had laid beside him on his pillow. As he
fondled and looked at the flower, more and more it gradually began to
assume the face and features of a delicate little old lady whom he
knew. It was a white pansy, with faint lavender patches on its
lateral and lower petals; dashed, like all its kind, by little touches
of darker hue. Yes, it was a face--Miss Lucy's face. Those two white
upper leaves were her snowy curls under her every-day lace cap. The
eyes, the keen, whimsical little mouth--all were there; and the
newsboy looked and remembered--till the eyes seemed to gather tears
and the pursed-up mouth to tremble like a child's--like Sarah Jane's,
when she had been denied a share in her brothers' games.

Had there been tears in Miss Lucy's eyes, last night, behind those
gleaming glasses? Had it been out of love, after all, that she had
given him her