But those were happy hearts he left behind him, and sweet were the dreams they dreamed that night. Mary, the summation and perfect example of Irish housewives, dreamed of a little home in the suburbs, with an orchard and garden, and a yard for chickens, and a house for the cow, and a pen for the pigs, where she could be busy and happy all day long, working for her loved ones. Jack dreamed of a new gown his wife should have, and of new dresses for Mamie, and some new books for Allan, and a new pipe for himself,—for Jack had only a limited idea of what twenty-five hundred dollars would accomplish. And Allan dreamed of the day when he, too, could come in as Jed Hopkins had done, and leave behind him a princely gift.

“Jack,” said Mary, at the table next morning, the memory of her dream still strong upon her, “I’ve been wishin’ we could move t’ some little place where we could kape chickens an’ a cow.”

“I wish so, too, Mary,” said Jack. “Mebbe some day we kin.”

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“It ’d be jest th’ place fer Mamie,—she don’t git enough outdoors.”

“Why, what’s th’ matter with her?” asked Jack, with a quick glance at the child.

“Nothin’ at all,” Mary hastened to assure him; “but she ought t’ have a big yard t’ play in—an’ th’ tracks is mighty dangerous.”

“Yes, they is,” Jack agreed. “I wish we could git away from them.”

“Well, I’ll look around,” said Mary, and wisely let the subject drop there.

She did look around, and to such good purpose that two days later, which was Sunday, she led Jack triumphantly to a little house standing back from the road in a grove of trees, just outside the city limits.

“I wanted ye to look at it,” she said. “I thought mebbe you’d like t’ live here.”

From the triumphant way in which she showed him about the place, and pointed out its beauties and advantages, it was quite evident that her own mind was made up. And, indeed, it was a perfect love of a place. The house was well-built and contained eight rooms—just the right number; the yard in front was shaded by graceful maples, and flanked on the left by a hedge of lilac. Behind it was a milk-house, built of brick, and with a long stone trough at the bottom, through which cold, pure water from a near-by spring was always flowing. Then there was a garden of nearly half ? 328 ? an acre; an orchard containing more than a hundred trees, and outbuildings—just such outbuildings as Mary had always longed for, roomy and dry and substantial. Nearly an hour was consumed in the inspection, and finally they sat down together on the steps leading up to the front porch.

“It’s a mighty nice place,” said Jack. “There can’t be no mistake about that.”

“An’ it’s fer sale,” said Mary. “Fer sale cheap.”

“Well, he’ll be a lucky man what gits it.”

“Jack,” said Mary, with sudden intensity, “you kin be that man—all you have t’ do is to write your name acrost th’ back of that little slip o’ pink paper an’ give it t’ me. T’-morrer I’ll bring you th’ deed fer this place, an’ we’ll move in jest as soon as I kin git it cleaned up.”

Jack looked about him and hesitated.

“I wanted you t’ have a new dress, Mary,” he said at last. “A silk one, what shines an’ rustles when ye walk—like Mrs. Maroney’s.”

“What do I keer fer a silk dress?” demanded Mary, fiercely. “Not that!” and she snapped her fingers. “I got plenty o’ duds. But a home like this, Jack,—I want a home like this!”

There was an appeal in her voice there was no resisting, even had Jack felt inclined to resist, which he did not in the least. He took from his pocket the slip of pink paper, now a little soiled, and from the other the stump of a lead pencil. ? 329 ? Slowly and painfully he wrote his name, then handed the check to Mary.

“There you are,” he said. “An’ I’m glad t’ do it, darlint. Fer this place suits me, too.”

And a pair of red-birds in the lilac hedge were astonished and somewhat scandalized to see the woman, who had been sitting quietly enough, fling herself upon him and hug him until he begged for mercy.

Mamie had remained at home to entertain Allan, which she did by getting him to read to her. She had grown to like Jean Valjean, too, though she preferred the thrilling portions of the story to the quieter ones which told of Bishop Welcome. This time she chose to hear again of Jean Valjean’s flight across Paris with Cosette—how she shivered when he allowed that piece of money to rattle on the floor, or when, looking backward, he saw the police following him through the night; how she shuddered when he found himself trapped in that blind alley, hemmed in by lofty walls, where all seemed lost; and then the horrors of the hours that followed—But once Cosette was stowed safely away in the hut of the old, lame gardener, the curly head began to nod, and Allan, looking up at last from his reading, saw that she had gone to sleep.

He laid his book aside, and sat for a long time looking down over the yards, busy even on Sunday; ? 330 ? for the work of a great railroad never ceases, day or night, from year end to year end. He thought of the evening, nearly three years agone, when he had first crossed the yards by Jack Welsh’s side, a homeless boy, who was soon to find a home indeed. How many times he had crossed them since! How many times—

A man was cross............