Arrived opposite her, he stopped. “Lady,” he said, in a whining voice, “please give a poor sick man some money to buy medicine.”
“What’s the matter with you?” she asked, promptly.
“An awful internal trouble, lady,” he said, laying his hand on his side. “Intermittent pains come on every evening at this time.”
“You don’t look ill,” replied Berty, suspiciously. “Your face is as bronzed as a sailor’s.”
“The doctors prescribed outdoor air, lady,” he went on, whiningly.
“I haven’t any money for you.”
The man, from his station in the road, looked back toward the city, then forward in the direction of the iron works. There was not a soul in sight, and as quick as a flash an angry sentence sprang to the girl’s lips, “Let me by.”
“But, lady, I want some money,” he said, persistently, and he stood in her way.
She surveyed him contemptuously. “You want to make me give you some, but I tell you you couldn’t do it.”