“Richard is proud,” she answered simply.  “He used to say he’d rather die than take charity—­and now he’s come to it.  And it’s—­that man, sir, who’s got on his brain, and changed him.  He wasn’t always like this, but now he can’t seem to think of anything else.  He wakes up in the night . . . .  And he used to have such a sweet nature—­you wouldn’t have known him . . . and came home so happy in the evenings in Alder Street, often with a little fruit, or something he’d bought for us, and romp with Dicky in the yard, and I’d stand and laugh at them.  Even after we’d lost our money, when he was sick that time, he didn’t feel this way.  It grew on him when he couldn’t get work, and then he began to cut things out of the papers about Mr. Parr.  And I have sometimes thought that that’s kept him from getting work.  He talks about it, and people don’t know what to make of him.  They don’t know how hard he’d try if they’d give him something.”. . . .

“We shall find something,” said the rector, striving to throw into his voice confidence and calm.  He did not dare to look at her, but continued to move the fan.

The child stirred a little.  Mrs. Garvin put out her hand.

“Yes, the doctor was here.  He was very kind.  Oh, sir,” she exclaimed, “I hope you won’t think us ungrateful—­and that Mr. Bentley won’t.  Dr. Jarvis has hopes, sir,—­he says—­I forget the name he called it, what Dicky has.  It’s something uncommon.  He says it was—­brought on by the heat, and want of food—­good food.  And he’s coming himself in the morning to take him out to that hospital beyond the park—­in an automobile, sir.  I was just thinking what a pity it is Dicky wouldn’t realize it.  He’s always wanted to ride in one.”  Suddenly her tears flowed, unheeded, and she clung to the little hand convulsively.  “I don’t know what I shall do without him, Sir, I don’t . . . .  I’ve always had him . . . and when he’s sick, among strangers.” . . .

The rector rose to the occasion.

“Now, Mrs. Garvin,” he said firmly, “you must remember that there is only one way to save the boy’s life.  It will be easy to get you a room near the hospital, where you can see him constantly.”

“I know—­I know, sir.  But I couldn’t leave his father, I couldn’t leave Richard.”  She looked around distractedly.  “Where is he?”

“He will come back presently,” said the rector.  “If not, I will look for him.”

She did not reply, but continued to weep in silence.  Suddenly, above the confused noises of the night, the loud notes of a piano broke, and the woman whose voice he had heard in the afternoon began once more with appalling vigour to sing.  The child moaned.

Mrs. Garvin started up hysterically.

“I can’t stand it—­I can’t stand her singing that now,” she sobbed.

Thirty feet away, across the yard, Hodder saw the gleaming window from which the music came.  He got to his feet.  Another verse began, with more of the brazen emphasis of the concert-hall singer than ever.  He glanced at the woman beside him, irresolutely.