"Minnie!" he muttered hoarsely, and all his strength seemed to desert him as he spoke--"Minnie, child! where are you?"
He sank upon the ground with a wild shudder, and lay as if death had overtaken him. At the same moment there issued from the corner of the room where the deepest shadows gathered, a child-girl, so marvellously like him, with her fair waving hair, her large beautifully-shaped mouth, her white teeth, and her great restless gray eyes, that Joshua knew at once that they were father and daughter.
Minnie crept to the man, and sat beside him. She spoke to him, but he did not reply. And then she looked at Joshua and Susan, whose forms were dimly discernible in the gathering gloom.
"What is the matter with father?" she asked of them in a faint moaning voice.
"Some bad boys threw a stone at him, and hit him on the forehead," Joshua answered. "He will be better presently, I hope."
Minnie did not heed what he said, but felt eagerly in her father's pockets, and, not finding what she searched for, began to cry.
"No, no," she said, beating her hands together; "it is not that. He is weak and ill because he has had nothing to eat. I thought he would have brought home enough to buy some bread, but he hasn't a penny."
Joshua remembered the man's words, "Money! I want money!" and he immediately realized that the poor creatures were in want.
"Are you hungry, Minnie?" he asked.
"I have not had any breakfast," she answered wearily. "No more has father. Nor any dinner. We had some bread last night. We ate it all up. Father went out to-day, hoping to earn a little money, and he has come home without any. We shall die, I suppose. But I should like something to eat first."