But few indeed were the high-born ladies a hundred and twenty years ago who ever penetrated the dark places where their suffering brothers and sisters lived and died in penury and want. Class distinction was then rigid, and the sun of womanly tenderness and compassion had not as yet risen on the horizon with healing on its wings. Thus the two wretched attics, furnished with the barest necessities of life--to which she ascended by dark, narrow stairs--was indeed a new world to Griselda Mainwaring. She shrank back when the door of the room was opened, and turned away her head from the pitiful sight before her. The sick man was propped up on his miserable bed, the child kneeling by him listening to, and trying to soothe, his incoherent mutterings. Leslie Travers went in first and touched the child's shoulder. "I have brought the lady to see you, and to ask what she can do for you." Instead of answering, Norah held up her hand as if to beg Leslie to be silent, and continued to stroke her father's long thin hands with one of hers, while with the other she pressed the rag of vinegar and water on his burning brow. Presently the muttering ceased, and the breathing became more regular, and then Norah rose, and said in a low voice: "Nothing stops his wild talk till I kneel by him and hold his hand, and stroke his forehead; that is why I could not speak, sir." Then the child went up to the threshold of the door where Griselda still stood, and said: "I thought you would come--I felt sure, lady, you would come; but do not be afraid, he is asleep now, and may sleep for an hour." Griselda felt ashamed of the disgust she could not conceal at what she saw. But the true womanly instinct asserted itself, and pointing to an open door leading into another garret, she said: "May I go in there?" "Yes, it is my room; it is where I put the clothes when I have mended them. The queen's gauze veil got torn, and I can mend gauze better than anyone, so Mrs. Betts gave it to me. Mrs. Betts is kind to me." Then seeing Griselda's puzzled look at the heterogeneous mass of finery heaped up on a table supported against the wall, as it was minus one leg, the child explained: "I mend the actresses' dresses. Mrs. Betts is the wardrobe keeper at the theatre, and she has had pity on me, or--or I think we should have starved." "Well," Griselda said, "I have brought you money to buy food, and surely you want a fire; and where is your bed?" The child pointed to a mattress in the corner under the sloping angle of the roof, and said: "I sleep there most nights, but now he is so bad I watch by him." Griselda opened her sachet and took from it a crimson silk purse. "Here are two guineas," she said; "get all you want." Norah clasped her hands in an ecstasy.