"Here--quick--little girl, take this," she cried, tearing open the little jeweled purse at her belt, and thrusting all its contents into the small, grimy hands.

Maggie stared in wonder. Then her whole face lighted up.

"Lucky stars!" she cried gleefully, her eyes on the shining coins.

"T'ank lucky stars!" And she turned and ran with all her small might toward the house.

"Quick--come--let us go," begged Margaret, "before the mother sees--the money!" And Brandon, smiling indulgently at the generosity that was so fearful of receiving thanks, lost no time in putting a long stretch of roadway between themselves and the tall, gaunt woman behind them.

CHAPTER XVII

"Stars--t'ank lucky stars," Maggie was still shouting gleefully when she reached her mother's side.

Mrs. Durgin bent keen eyes on her young daughter's face.

"Maggie, what was they sayin' to ye?" she began, pulling the little girl into the house. Suddenly her jaw dropped. She stooped and clutched the child's hands. "Why, Maggie, it's money--stacks of it!" she exclaimed, prying open the small fingers.

"Stars--lucky stars!" cooed Maggie. Maggie liked new words and phrases, and she always said them over and over until they were new no longer.

Mrs. Durgin shook her daughter gently, yet determinedly. Her small black eyes looked almost large, so wide were they with amazement.

"Maggie, Maggie, tell me--what did they say to ye?" she demanded again.

"Why did they give ye all this money?"

Maggie was silent. Her brow was drawn into a thoughtful frown.

"But, Maggie, think--there must 'a' been somethin'. What did ye do?"

"There wa'n't," insisted the child. "I jest felled down an' got up, an'

they said it."

"Said what?"

"'T'ank lucky stars.'"

A sudden thought sent a quick flash of fear to Mrs. Durgin's eyes.

"Maggie, they didn't hurt ye," she cried, dropping on her knees and running swift, anxious fingers over the thin little arms and legs and body. "They didn't hurt ye!"

Maggie shook her head. At that moment a shadow darkened the doorway, and the kneeling woman glanced up hastily.

"Oh, it's you, Mis' Magoon," she said to the small, tired-looking woman in the doorway.

"Yes, it's me," sighed the woman, dragging herself across the room to a chair. "What time did Nellie leave here?"

"Why, I dunno--mebbe four o'clock. Why?"

The woman's face contracted with a sharp spasm of pain.

"She wa'n't within half a mile of the mill when I met her, yet she was pantin' an' all out o' breath then. She'll be late, 'course, an' you know what that means."

"Yes, I know," sighed Mrs. Durgin, sympathetically. "She--she hadn't orter gone."

Across the room Mrs. Magoon's head came up with a jerk.

"Don't ye s'pose I know that? The child's sick, an' I know it. But what diff'rence does that make? She works, don't she?"

For a moment Mrs. Durgin did not speak. Gradually her eyes drifted back to Maggie and the little pile of coins on the table.

"Mis' Magoon, see," she cried eagerly, "what the lady give Maggie. They was in one o' them 'nauty-mobiles,' as Maggie calls 'em, an' Maggie felled down in the road. She wa'n't hurt a mite--not even scratched, but they give her all this money."

The woman on the other side of the room sniffed disdainfully.

"Well, what of it? They'd oughter give it to her," she a.s.serted.

"But they wa'n't ter blame, an' they didn't hurt her none--not a mite,"

argued the other.

"No thanks ter them, I'll warrant," snapped Mrs. Magoon. "For my part, I wouldn't tech their old money." Then, crossly, but with undeniable interest, she asked: "How much was it?"

Mrs. Durgin laughed.

"Never you mind," she retorted, as she gathered up the coins from the table; "but thar's enough so's I'm goin' ter get them cough-drops fur Nellie, anyhow. So!" And she turned her back and pretended not to hear the faint remonstrances from the woman over by the window. Later, when she had bought the medicine and had placed it in Mrs. Magoon's hands, the remonstrances were repeated in a higher key, and were accompanied again with an angry snarl against the world in general and automobiles in particular.

"But why do ye hate 'em so?" demanded Mrs. Durgin, "--them autymobiles?

They hain't one of 'em teched ye, as I knows of."

There was no answer.

"I don't believe ye knows yerself," declared the questioner then; and at the taunt the other raised her head.

"Mebbe I don't," she flamed, "an' 'tain't them I hate, anyway--it's the folks in 'em. It's rich folks. I've allers hated 'em anywheres, but 'twa'n't never so bad as now since them things came. They look so--so comfortable--the folks a-leanin' back on their cushions; an' so--so _free_, as if there wa'n't nothin' that could bother 'em. 'Course I knew before that there was rich folks, an' that they had fine clo's an' good things ter eat, an' shows an' parties, an' spent money; but I didn't _see_ 'em, an' now I do. I _see_ 'em, I tell ye, an' it makes me realize how I ain't comfortable like they be, nor Nellie ain't neither!"

"But they ain't all bad--rich folks," argued the thin, black-eyed woman, earnestly. "Some of 'em is good."

The other shook her head.

"I hain't had the pleasure o' meetin' that kind," she rejoined grimly.

"Well, I have," retorted Maggie's mother with some spirit. "Look at that lady ter-night what give Maggie all that money."

There was no answer, and after a moment Mrs. Durgin went on. Her voice was lower now, and not quite clear.

"Thar was another one, too, an' she was jest like a angel out o' heaven.

It was years ago--much as twelve or fourteen, when I lived in New York.