James spoke guardedly, now he remembered that what he had overheard was not his to tell. The stranger showed no disposition to carry the subject further, but fell into thought, and moved forward as if he had been alone. “There, there! you see Eva’s morning glories running up the window,” cried the boy. “Is this your home, my boy?” “Yes, sir, while we can keep it, that is; but who knows what good luck will come next! If I were only a man now!” “So you long to be a man?” said the stranger, looking down at the lad with sorrowful interest. “Yes, I do. Then, sir, I would keep that roof over my mother’s head in spite of all the mortgages in the world. Oh! how I would work!” “Brave lad, how I envy you.” “Envy me! Well, yes, I am a good deal happier than one could expect. Working for women who love you isn’t bad fun; but here is the gate, and there is Ruthy, you can see her through the window. Won’t she wonder who it is, and what brings me home this time of day?” “You seem to have forgotten your hurt?” “No, it feels a little heavy, and smarts some; but I’ll pull my cap down not to frighten them. Of course, it’s nothing; but then one’s mother is so tender of a fellow. There!” James pulled his cap far over his bruised forehead, and opening the gate, invited his strange guest to pass in. CHAPTER XIII. THE GENTLE INVALID. Ruth Laurence though an invalid, was pining for something which might occupy the slender hands which seemed all too frail for labor. She could do many pretty trifles, however, with those deft fingers, and in her soul lay a deep love of art, which they were patiently striving to work out, whenever a bit of wax or a scrap of paper fell in her way. Sometimes, as the wind swept through the open windows of that little room, it carried off tiny morsels of paper, on which a butterfly, a bird, or a flower was sketched, which went whirling off among the old-fashioned flowers like a living thing. Sometimes Ruth would manage to get ravelings from scraps of silk, out of which she wrought rose-buds for pincushions, and groups of blossoms for segar-cases which brought in a shilling or two, now and then, for the scanty household-fund, and gave her a world of happiness in the sweet power of creation. She was lying on her couch, close by the window, with a bit of drawing paper in her hand, on which the soft shadows of a white rose were forming themselves, when a click of the gate-latch, and the sound of strange footsteps made her start and look through the window. She saw her brother James by the gate, and with him a tall man, whom she had never seen before. The stranger waited a moment for the boy to complete what he was saying, and then crossed the little yard, while James ran forward to open the door.