Arriving in the city, she examined a directory in the nearest drug store and copied off the numbers and localities of all the police stations in the city proper. Then she found her way without much trouble to the market and asked the tall, broad-shouldered policeman on duty there for directions to the nearest station. He looked down pityingly on the young girl, appealing to him with her white face and eyes that betrayed her suffering on that glad Christmas morning.
“Nothing serious, is it, miss? A fight, maybe, or something o’ that sort?”
“Oh, no, sir! I only want to see if—if—somebody”—
The kind-hearted officer guessed her trouble immediately.
“I see, I see,” said he, softening his voice still more. “He didn’t get home last night after he was paid off. Well, I guess you’ll find it all right; anyway, I hope you will. Take your first turn to the left, and two blocks further you’ll come to my station. Tell the sergeant you saw Brown, and that I sent you to him for information.”
Charity thanked him with a grateful look that was better than words, and moved with rapid steps along the icy sidewalk in the direction indicated. She was courteously received at the station, but no one knew anything about Tom. Nor did they in the next station she visited, nor in the third or fourth. It was now nearly noon, and people were beginning to sit down to their Christmas dinners. The table at Farmer Ralston’s was always a jolly place, and at Christmas time the fun was uproarious. Charity had been invited every year since she could remember, and she gave a little gulp as she thought of the row of bright, laughing faces that would have been gathered in the old kitchen, still sweet with the resinous odors of the evergreen that had lain there in piles in those last happy days that now seemed ages ago. Wearily she mounted the granite steps of Station Five and repeated her question. The lieutenant, a brisk, wiry man, with a heavy gray moustache and little, piercing eyes, cast a quick glance at her and consulted his book. Presently he gave a little nod, and raising his voice, called out, “Norcross, here a minute!”