When the children had gone to school the next morning, Sam took a car and went into the city, going first to a bank to have a large draft cashed. Then he spent many busy hours going from store to store and buying clothes, caps, soft underwear, suit cases, dresses, night clothes, and books. Last of all he bought a large dressed doll. All these things he had sent to his room at the hotel, leaving a man there to pack the trunks and suit cases, and get them to the station. A large, motherly-looking woman, an employé of the hotel, who passed through the hall, offered to help with the packing. After another visit or two Sam got back upon the car and went again to the house. In his pockets he had several thousands of dollars in large bills. He had remembered the power of cash in deals he had made in the past. “I will see what it will do here,” he thought. In the house Sam found the black-haired woman lying on a couch in the living-room. As he came in at the door she arose unsteadily and looked at him. “There’s a bottle in the cupboard in the kitchen,” she said. “Get me a drink. Why do you hang about here?” Sam brought the bottle and poured her a drink, pretending to drink with her by putting the bottle to his lips and throwing back his head. “What was your husband like?” he asked. “Who? Jack?” she said. “Oh, he was all right. He was stuck on me. He stood for anything until I brought men home here. Then he got crazy and went away.” She looked at Sam and laughed. “I didn’t care much for him,” she added. “He couldn’t make money enough for a live woman.” Sam began talking of the saloon she intended buying. “The children will be a bother, eh?” he said. “I have an offer for the house,” she said. “I wish I didn’t have the kids. They are a nuisance.” “I have been figuring that out,” Sam told her. “I know a woman in the East who would take them and raise them. She is wild about kids. I should like to do something to help you. I might take them to her.” “In the name of Heaven, man, lead them away,” she laughed, and took another drink from the bottle. Sam drew from his pocket a paper he had secured from a downtown attorney. “Get a neighbour in here to witness this,” he said. “The woman will want things regular. It releases you from all responsibility for the kids and puts it on her.” She looked at him suspiciously. “What’s the graft? Who gets stuck for the fares down east?” Sam laughed and going to the back door shouted to a man who sat under a tree back of the next house smoking a pipe. “Sign here,” he said, putting the paper before her. “Here is your neighbour to sign as witness. You do not get stuck for a cent.” The woman, half drunk, signed the paper, after a long doubtful look at Sam, and when she had signed and had taken another drink from the bottle lay down again on the couch.