Finally she sat, staring at the ridiculous gaping mouthpiece. Where would they take him, if he were--dead. Wasn't there a morgue? The word twisted and plunged in her, a slimy thing. She would call the morgue. She heard Miss Kelly's firm voice, "No, you mustn't bother your mother, not now. Come and have your supper, Marian." He couldn't be dead. That warm, hard, slender body--how absurd! Morbid. He was somewhere, just around the corner. Death, that's the queer thing. Who had said that? Henrietta. She would call her--and ask her. Before she had given the number, the front door clattered, opened. Catherine pushed herself erect; she was stiff, rigid. She found herself in the hall. Charles, glowering, and in front of him, propelled by his father's hand on his shoulder, Spencer! She couldn't move, or speak. "Well, here's the fine young man," said Charles. Spencer wriggled under his hand. His eyes smoldered with resentment, and his mouth was sullen. Catherine's hands yearned toward him. She mustn't frighten him, but just to touch him, to feel him! "A great note!" Charles came down the hall, righteous anger on his face. "I called up the police and had them send out their signals." "Where was he?" Catherine had him now; she lifted Charles's hand away and touched the boy. He was trembling--Charles had been rough! "I was just playing," Spencer cried out, gruffly. "I didn't know you'd tell the police." "You've been told to come straight home, haven't you? Tell your mother what you told me, sir!" "Charles!" Catherine's flash at him was unpremeditated. "You needn't bully him!" "Tell her!" roared Charles. "I just said"--Spencer's words tumbled out, full of impotent fury and indistinct with tears--"I said--I said--I didn't want to come home to that old Kelly. I didn't want----" "He said," remarked Charles coldly, "that he saw no use of coming home when his mother wasn't here." "But where was he?" Catherine had her arm over his shoulder, in a protective gesture. "Where did you find him?" "I heard his voice. As I came along Broadway, past that vacant lot. He was down behind the bill boards there, with some street gamins, doing the Lord knows what." "We just built a fire, Moth-er." Spencer pressed against her. "I didn't know it was so late. We were bandits." "Go on into your room, Spencer. You know you should come straight home." "He ought to be punished," declared Charles, as the boy vanished in relieved haste. "I judge you have been punishing him." Catherine stood between Charles and Spencer's closing door. "He was trembling, and almost crying, and he never cries." "Did you want me to kiss him when I found him, after the way I've spent the afternoon?" "You want to make him feel as bad as you have!" Catherine leaned against the wall. She was exhausted; her heart was beating in short, spasmodic jerks, as if she had run for miles.