“The children had typhoid fever, Tony and Sadie and Stella.” The quiet, brown-eyed widow took up the story. “Tony took sick at the camp—he’d only been there a few weeks—and came home the last of October ready to die. Sadie took it next. She was carrying little Tony and it went hard with her. Then Stella came down. I thought we would lose them all. We had no money for anything. It was weeks and weeks before Tony got better and then he wasn’t strong. I took in washing when the worst was over, and Pap did all he could. Tony, he’s an orphan and Italian besides,—a Dago they call him.” Her voice trailed off despondently. “Tony is as good an American as ever lived,” Sadie spoke up fiercely, “a sight better than the scrubs around here. Supposing his folks was Italian. What difference does that make?” “Tony got work teaming,” the old man spoke again. “We had no food in the house, the weather was cold, Sadie was weak from the fever and crying with hunger all the time. He got to taking things from the cars and bringing them home. One time he brought a case of canned soup. How the girls did go for it. It was their salvation. “Then one night it was snowing hard. Tony came in all tuckered out—he never was one of these husky boys—and he was sitting over the stove, with Sadie trying to cheer him up. All of a sudden the door flew open with a bang and in walks a couple of men—didn’t knock or nothing, just walked in—and put the handcuffs on him and dragged him away. I’ll never forget his black eyes, looking so big in his white face as he stared back at Sadie who had fallen in a faint.” “And now he’s in jail, my Tony. He never knew what it was to have a single soul to love him till he met me. Just an orphan and a bound boy. He was always so good to me, working hard for a home and children. And now he can’t see his own son. Oh, Tony, Tony!” She flung herself about in agony. “Hush, honey, hush. Think of little Tony. You’ll poison the milk if you take on that away.” The frail mother quieted her grief and clasped her baby in an ecstasy of mother-love. “I must take good care of you, mother’s little angel. Daddy will come back to his own little baby boy some day.” The rain had stopped, so we said good-bye to the unfortunate family and resumed our journey. “There is no real poverty in the country districts, is there now?” I remarked as we pushed the wheel along the sloppy road. “Oh, Tamas knows—he knows,” returned Dan grimly. The old Confederate had told us of another truck farm not far distant where we could probably find employment, so we located a convenient clump of willows and made camp for the night. Early next morning we applied for work at the farm and were set to the task of weeding onions, ten hours’ work for a dollar a day and board. Slowly the hours dragged past. The noon hour found me far too weary to eat, so I flung myself face down under a tree, while Dan sought the cook house with the other hands.