"How did you know me?" she asked. "What makes you care?"

"I know your name because you gave it when you first came out of your faint, and how could I help caring? You are pretty near my own age, I think."

"I'm twenty-two."

"Then you are a little the older. Bertha, have you a mother?"

She shook her head sadly.

"No, I haven't anybody; it would have been better, I say. What can a girl do all alone in this great, wicked world?"

"Tell me about it, Bertha; perhaps I can help you."

No one could resist that tone; and Bertha, after one long look into the sympathetic face, drew a sigh and began.

"We were always poor, but not to real want. Father had a small farm, and we lived off from it till he died. Then it all went for debts and funeral expenses, and we took what little was left, mother and I, and came here. We managed to live while she was alive. She took in sewing, and I worked in Ball's factory, and we were as cosey as could be in our one room; but last winter she died."

Her eyes filled with tears, and she stopped a moment, then went on.