"Oh, how delightful it is to have a home. A place where someone with love in their hearts awaits you, and, when the door is opened, gathers you in welcome." She thanked Him that is Holy, for being so kind to her. She had arrived at last, and with a delightful sigh, raised her foot to the step, and as she did so, her eyes glanced through the window. The next moment she fell back, and placed her hand upon her breast, while her heart thumped violently within. Then she turned, and disappeared into the night, while those inside waited. CHAPTER NINE "_Wha's Y' Man?_" On she flew. Across the car tracks she stumbled, but she didn't stop, nor did she look to see whether anyone was coming or not. She thought of nothing, but to be away, away, away! Down the street that was dark and rough, and led to where she did not know, nor did she even care. She was going away, away from everybody. She would hide herself from the world. She could go to another city, but there was no use in that either. She cried half aloud as she hurried along: "I can stand it no longer, I can stand it no longer! I want to die, oh, I want to die!" "I know," she choked at last, as she stumbled down the middle of a dark alley, in which she now found herself. "I know," she cried again. And she hurried on, as soon as she had caught her breath. "It is the river. Yes, the river." She quickened her pace as she came into a street that was at the end of the alley. It was wider. She hastened down a hill that seemed to her a mile long, and maybe it was more. But when she had hurried two blocks along this, she left the middle of the street and took to the sidewalk, and slowed to a walk. "I can't go on like this. It will excite people. I must walk, but I must hurry, hurry, hurry!" She had covered many blocks, when she came abreast of buildings occupied by colored people. There was a barber shop where men were being shaved, and a restaurant where others were eating; a soda fountain also, and she wondered whether the people who conducted it made any money this time of the year. The night seemed to have grown much colder, from the frost that was on the windows, but Mildred Latham did not feel it. Her face, she felt it for a moment, was flushed. And then it occurred to her that her throat was dry. Oh, yes. She knew why, now. She had cried all the way from Mother Jane's to here--wherever it was. And her face was hot, her throat was dry, and she wanted water. She must have water, or she could no longer swallow. For a moment she hesitated before the soda fountain. Then she opened the door and entered. A man who sat in the rear approached. He was a neat man, with a heavy mustache. He invited her to a chair at a table that was near a glowing fire. She took it. He waited her order politely.