“But just think if he should be right!” said Gloria, quivering with excitement. “Wouldn't it be beautiful, just beautiful, if it should come true! It would almost make me forgive that awful man who did not mend the railing.” “But then,” said the nurse, “unless life changes all through for Sal, it might be worse to be beaten and starved and feel conscious of it, than to be beaten and starved in a half-demented condition.” “Oh, don't put it that way!” said Gloria. “I could not help thinking how little you can see of what her life all these years has been--you with your young sheltered life.” Gloria's face softened. “No; one cannot discern--that is, I mean I could not before to-day. But anything seems possible after all that has happened to-day.” It was while Gloria was standing on her own steps, having watched the District Nurse close her door, that she caught sight of a little figure flying up the street. It was Dinney. She waited impatiently for his approach. “I've got it, Miss Gloria!” he said, coming panting up the steps. “I've got it! I struck the very man and he told me. He wrote it down for me. It belongs to an estate. Here it is.” Gloria looked down at the card that bore a few lines indifferently traced. But what her eyes met caused the color to drift from her face. “Are you _sure_, Dinney?” she said sharply to the boy. “Are you _sure_? Quick!” A faintness was seizing her. “Sure,” answered the boy. The girl laid a trembling hand upon the door. “I will get the money for you, Dinney, when I know you are dead right.” The voice was not the voice Dinney knew. Looking at the girl, he saw that tears had sprung to her eyes. She was fumbling blindly with the latch-key. “Miss Gloria,” he said, in an awed voice, as he took the key and fitted it for her, “don't you go to feeling like that.” Suddenly he was a man in his protective earnestness. “It ain't nothin' to you.” But Gloria had passed him and was already ascending the broad flight of stairs leading from the reception hall. She had forgotten her key, she had forgotten to close the door. Dinney thoughtfully took the key out and placed it on a stand near. Then closing the door after him, he went slowly down the steps. Somehow the brightness had gone from the day--he knew not why. But it was gone. He turned toward Pleasant Street--Gloria's “Treeless Street”--but there was no whistle now upon his lips. CHAPTER VII. It was a white-faced girl that appeared before Walter McAndrew and his wife as they were seated at the dining-room table. Gloria had stood what seemed to her an age by the window in her room, looking down upon the card Dinney had left with her. At last she threw off her hat and jacket, and, turning, went below. As Mr. McAndrew caught sight of the white, strained face of the girl he pushed back his chair and sprang to his feet. “What is it?” he exclaimed. But his wife gave one startled look and then bowed her head as though waiting for a storm to pass.