“God bless my soul!  God bless my soul!” he exclaimed, trying to draw the comforters more closely about him.

Mercy went up to him, and, sitting down by his side, began to talk to him in a perfectly natural tone, as if she were making an ordinary call on an invalid in his own home.  She said nothing to suggest that he had done any thing unnatural in hiding himself, and spoke of his severe cold as being merely what every one else had been suffering from for some time.  Then she told him how ill her mother was, and succeeded in really arousing his interest in that.  Finally, she said,—­

“But I must go now.  I can’t be away from my mother long.  I will come and see you again to-morrow.  Shall I find you here or at your home?”

“Well, I was thinking I ’d better move home to-day,” said he.

His wife and son involuntarily exchanged glances.  This was more than they had dared to hope.

“Yes, I would, if I were you,” replied Mercy, still in a perfectly natural tone.  “It would be so much better for you to be in a room with a fire in it for a few days.  There isn’t any way of warming this room, is there?” said she, looking all about, as if to see if it might not be possible still to put up a stove there. “’Siah” turned his head away to hide a smile, so amused was he by the tact of the remark.  “No, I see there is no stovepipe-hole here,” she went on, “so you’d much better move home.  I’m going by the stable.  Let me send Seth right up with the carriage, won’t you?”

“No, no!  Bless my soul!  Thinks I’m made of money, don’t she!  No, no!  I can walk.”  And the old half-crazy glare came into his eyes.

Mercy went nearer to him, and laid her hand gently on his.

“Mr. Wheeler,” said she, “you did something very kind for me once:  now won’t you do something once more,—­just once?  I want you to go home in the carriage.  It is a terribly cold day, and the streets are very icy.  I nearly fell several times myself coming over here.  You will certainly take a terrible cold, if you walk this morning.  Please say I may get the carriage.”

“Bless my soul!  Bless my soul, child!  Go get it then, if you care so much; but tell him I’ll only pay a quarter,—­only a quarter, remember.  They’d take every cent I’ve got.  They are all wolves, wolves, wolves!”

“Yes, I’ll tell him only a quarter.  I’ll have him here in a few minutes!” exclaimed Mercy, and ran out of the room hastily before the old man could change his mind.

As good luck would have it, Seth and his “kerridge” were in sight when Mercy reached the foot of the staircase.  So in less than five minutes she returned to the garret, exclaiming,—­

“Here is Seth now, Mr. Wheeler.  It is so fortunate I met him.  Now I can see you off.”  The old man was so weak that his son had to carry him down the stairs; and his face, seen in the broad daylight, was ghastly.  As they placed him in the carriage, he called out to his wife and son, sharply,—­