"That is because it is so cold. It is not late yet. We will wait a little longer, and then Maggie——"
"O, mother! Do not ask me to go. It is so cold, and suppose—suppose I had to go into a saloon again. It nearly kills me to go about such places."
"You might meet him, Maggie, and keep him from going in."
"If my pa don't come tonight, he's a big liar, that's all!" broke in Johnnie, hotly.
His mother did not answer him. She was watching the face bent low over the tiny baby. She noted the careworn look and the nervous pressure of the hand held over the tiny one to keep it warm.
Presently the girl lifted her eyes to her mother. Those tender pleading eyes of the mother would have melted a harder heart than hers. She went to the bed and put the baby in, close to its mother's side. Then she threw her arms around the haggard woman's neck and kissed her passionately.
"Dear mother," she said, "I would do anything for you. I will go for father, and before it gets any later."
"Pray, child! Pray every breath you draw! Pray every step you take that you may find him before it is too late. If you do not—I cannot imagine what is to become of us. Pray! God is not cruel. Surely he will hear us in our misery."
Would you see the drunkard's daughter dressed for a walk this bitter night? A frail, slender girl, who should have been warmly clad, she is dressed in thinnest, shabby cotton, through which the elements will play as through rags of gauze, while the flesh of her feet, unprotected by her almost soleless shoes, will press against the sleet. The two faded pink roses that flap forlornly on the side of her coarse straw hat bear a silent suggestion of pathos—a faint remembrance, perhaps, of the days of departed happiness.