But he struck me! he struck me! He will never get a dollar now." Relieved, for the natural good sense of the woman was reasserting itself, I gave her hands a squeeze and quickly ran back to where the mayor was holding the door for me.
"She is all right now," I remarked, as I slid by him upstairs; and that was all I said.

The rest must wait a more auspicious moment--the moment when he really would have time to take up the gage which Mr.Steele had thrown down to him in his final words.
I was not a witness to the parting interview between Mayor Packard and his wife; I had stolen into the nursery, for a look at the little one.
I found her sleeping sweetly, with one chubby hand under her rounded cheek.

Thus had she lain and thus had she slept during all those dreadful minutes, when her future hung, trembling in the balance..