"Me?" Tom hugged the arm he held. "Not till you turn me out!" They walked in silence for a block. "Pard," Tom began in a low voice, "I don't know why you've been so good to me. I don't know nuttin', an' I'm a lot o' trouble. Mebbe sometimes you t'ink I don't appreciate all what you've done for me. But I do. When I t'ink about when I tried to steal your coat a year ago, an' den when I t'ink about now--I certainly do appreciate. I'm goin' to work hard--an' I'm goin' to study hard--an' I'm goin' to do what you tell me. If I do, d'you t'ink I'll ever make somebody?" David pressed the arm closer. "My boy, you're going to make a splendid man!" Tom looked up; tears were in his eyes. "Pard--I'd die tryin'--for you!" he said. When they reached the apartment house that held their new home, David sent Tom upstairs and set out for St. Christopher's Mission. His sense of loneliness made his mind dwell upon Mr. Chambers's offer of millions; for earlier in the evening a messenger had brought a note from Helen which gave the substance of her talk with her father. He would not have returned an answer different from hers--yet in this moment he ached for those things which had been refused in his name, and the aching drew him to look upon that for which he had given them up. He paused across the street from St. Christopher's and gazed at the brilliant windows of the club-house and at the great window in the chapel that glowed in memory of Morton. Then he crossed the street and entered the club-house. A few young men and women were coming down the stairway, and a few struggling late-comers were mounting to the floors above. He stood irresolute, then noticing that farther down the hall the door of the assembly room was open, he cautiously joined the little knot of people who stood about it. The room was crowded with men and women, all in their best clothes. David quickly gathered from the talk of the officers on the platform, all women, that this was a meeting of the Women's Club, held for the double purpose of installing new officers and entertaining the members' husbands. He had been gazing in but a few minutes when the new president, a shapeless little woman, was sworn into office. The audience demanded a speech, and her homely face glowing with happiness and embarrassment, she responded in a few halting, grammarless phrases. "I hope I can do my duty," she ended, "so good that Dr. Morton, who got us to make this club, won't never be ashamed when he looks down on it."