Only a short time elapsed before the doctor and Thad reached the front door at the same minute.

“Wait for me in the library, Thad, if you don’t mind being late for your supper.  Doctor, I’ll show you the way upstairs,” and with this remark Hugh preceded the stout little physician up to the second floor.

As for Thad, he never once dreamed of “breaking away” at that most interesting stage.  Suppers occurred three hundred and sixty-five times a year, with an extra one thrown in for good measure when leap-year came around; but exciting events like the one happening to Hugh were of rare occurrence.  Catch him thinking of eating when there was a chance right at his door to have a hand in a thrilling drama that beat the “movies” all hollow!

So Thad sat down.

Hugh soon joined him.  He was immediately pounced upon by his curious chum, and plied with all manner of questions.  By degrees Thad “pumped him dry,” and there was nothing more to tell.

“We’ll have to wait until she comes back to her senses,” Hugh finally remarked sagely, “before we’ll be able to learn anything definite about them, mother and the doctor both say.”

“And she’s actually out of her head, is she, right now?” Thad demanded.

“Yes, and keeps on saying the same thing over and over, just as if it might have been in her mind so much lately.  She keeps on pleading with someone she calls grandfather, and begging him not to put them out of his heart and home, for little Joey’s sake—­it’s always little Joey she’s worrying about and not herself.  The doctor says she was utterly exhausted by want of sustaining food, added to anxiety and the exposure she had suffered.”

“But where could she have come from, Hugh?  She has never been in Scranton, you said that, and I never saw her before either.  You told me the little boy can only say his name is Joey Walters; and honest to goodness, Hugh, there isn’t a single family of that name in or around this town that I ever heard of.”

“They’ve been trying to get some clues out of the little chap,” continued Hugh, “but without much success.  All he’s said so far is that they’ve come ever so far, and that he liked riding on the cars first-rate, only mommy cried so much and wouldn’t eat every time he did.  From the way he talked they suspect that the young woman may have come from the West somewhere.”

“She is young then, Hugh?”

“Yes, not over twenty-five or so, the doctor says, but frail-looking.  He thinks there is nothing serious the matter with her, only that she’s been underfed for a long time, and has suffered.  Perhaps she’s denied herself proper food so as to save up enough money to make this trip.”

Thad shook his head as if feeling sad over the happening; for the boy had a tender heart.

“Well, I certainly hope she’ll be better tomorrow, and able to tell something about herself,” he went on to say, as he prepared to leave.  “And, Hugh, it was fine of your mother to refuse to let her be taken over to the Scranton Hospital, when the doctor proposed such a thing.”