[Illustration: “Everything was cold and dark.”] I will git out a Monday, and will start back as soon as they let me out. Somethin tells me I ort to be there; and its no use me tryin to find work in this place or any other. They either have “all the help they need,” or else “dont want to hire a old man.” Hopin this will find you well, and that some kind person has taken you in out of the big road, I am, Betsy, Your lovin but discouraged husband, JOBE GASKINS. Mistur Editure, the more I think of that letter, the more I think of that poor old man a carin for me, and a dreamin about me, the worse it makes my head ache and the higher it makes my fever. If I had the money I would send for a doctor, but I haint got it; and if I had, I haint got anybody to go. I jist have to lay here. No fire, no one to look at, no one to talk to—jist lay here and look at the ceilin and think. Ile have to quit. Hopin your folks are all well, BETSY GASKINS (Dimicrat), Wife of JOBE GASKINS (Republican). [Illustration] CHAPTER XLII. HATTIE MOORE. TUSCARAWAS COUNTY POOR-HOUSE, NEAR NEW PHILADELPHIA, O., March 15, 1896. MR. EDITOR:—My name is Hattie Moore. My age is seventeen. My father was a soldier. My mother is a widow. I was betrayed by one of the leading city officials, and while he to-day is performing the duty and drawing the salary of an office of trust and honor, his child and I, its girl mother, are inmates of this poor-house. I write to let you know about Betsy Gaskins. They brought her here yesterday. She is very sick. She is delirious and talks a great deal in her sleep, about somebody by the name of Jobe, and about their home and high interest, and $3,800, and being turned out, and all such things. Judging from the wrinkles on her face and the hard places in her hands, she must have been a hard-working old woman. I pity her so much that every now and then I steal into the room where they put her. I stayed in there nearly all night last night, though I knew it was against the rules. But my baby slept well, and I hated to let the poor woman lie in that room all night sick and alone. I just thought that if my old mother was sick and poor and taken to a place like this, I would love any girl who would be kind to her and pity her. I would love her even though she had been betrayed and was in the poor-house to get away from the taunts of a heartless world. I asked the man who brought her here who she was and where she came from.