Lucy caught her breath and started forward, then she remembered the woman.

“What is it?” she asked listlessly.

The woman stepped forward, and put out a hand to steady herself against the door; her face was distorted, and her voice came in gasps.

“You said I was to come if I needed you.  It’s Jimmy, ma’am—­he’s dead!”

It may be experience of suffering makes one especially tender to the heart-aches of others; at any rate, the article that Lucy Olcott wrote for the paper that night held the one touch of nature that makes the whole world kin.  She had taken Aunt Chloe, the old colored servant, and gone home with Mrs. Wiggs, relieving as far as possible the immediate need of the family.  Then she had come home and written their story, telling it simply, but with the passionate earnestness of one who, for the first time, has come into contact with poverty and starvation.  She told of the plucky struggle made by the boy, of his indomitable courage, of his final defeat, and she ended by asking help of any kind for the destitute family.

A week later she sat at her desk bewildered.  Her article, written on the impulse of the moment, with the one thought of making people understand, had fulfilled its mission.  For seven days she had done nothing but answer questions and notes, and receive contributions for the Wiggs family.  Money had arrived from all over the State, and from every class of society.  Eichenstine Bros. sent fifty dollars, and six ragged newsboys came to present thirty cents.  A lavender note, with huge monogram and written in white ink, stated that some of the girls of the “Gay Burlesque Troupe” sent a few dimes to the “kid’s” mother.  The few dimes amounted to fifteen dollars.  Mrs. Van Larkin’s coachman had to wait with her note while Lucy answered the questions of a lame old negro who had brought a quarter.

“Maria done tole me what was writ in de papah ’bout dat pore Chile,” he was saying.  “I sutenly do feel sorry fer he’s maw.  I ain’t got much, but I tole Maria I guess we could do without somethin’ to gib a quahter.”

So it continued.  Old and young, rich and poor, paid their substantial tribute of respect to Jimmy Wiggs.

Lucy counted up the long line of figures.  “Three hundred and sixty-five dollars!” she exclaimed; “and food, clothes, and coal enough to last them a year!”

It was like a direct answer to her prayer, and yet this poor little suppliant, instead of being duly exalted, put her head on the desk and wept bitterly.  Now that the need of the Wiggs family had been met, another appeal, silent and potent, was troubling her heart.

Redding had neither come nor written, and she was beginning to realize the seriousness of their misunderstanding.

CHAPTER IV

THE ANNEXATION OF CUBY

    “They well deserve to have,
    That know the strongest and surest way to get.”