Part 42 (1/2)

A LITTLE GLEAM AFAR

It was late in the autumn of that year, and upon a lonelyin the cold wind She was outside of a miserable little hut, in the doorway of which stood two men

For five or six years she had lived alone in that little hut

It was a very poor place, but it kept out the wind and the rain and the snow, and it was a horeater part of these years in which she had lived there alone, she had received, at irregular and so intervals, sue, from her son, as a sailorman upon seas of which she did not even know the name

But forson, and it was very little that she had been able to earn Soht have starved, had it not been for the charity of others almost as poor as she

As for rent, it had been due for a long ti that her landlord felt that further forbearance would be not only unprofitable, but that it would serve as a bad exaiven orders to eject the old woman from her hut She was now a pauper, and there were places where paupers would be taken care of

The old wo Her poor old eyes, a little dimmed with tears, were directed southward toward the far-away vanishi+ng-point of the rough and narrow road whichthe hills

She aiting for the arrival of a cart which a poor neighbor had pros to the nearest village, where there was a good road over which she ht walk to a place where paupers were taken care of A narrow stream, which roared and rushed around or over many a rock, ran at several points close to the road, and, swelled by heavy rains, had overflowed it to the depth of a foot or more The old woman and the two men in the doorway of the hut stood and waited for the cart to coan to rise in the north, and there was already a drizzle of rain At last they saw a little black spot upon the road, which soon proved to be a cart drawn by a rough pony On it cah the water where the streah stones in other places But, to their surprise, there were two persons in the cart

Perhaps the boy Sawney had with him a traveller as on his way north

This was true Sawney had picked up a traveller as glad to find a conveyance going across theperson in a heavy waterproof coat with its collar turned up over his ears

As soon as the cart stopped, near the hut, he jumped down and approached the two men in the doorway

”Is that theMcLeish?” he said, pointing to the old woman

They assured him that he was correct, and he approached her

”You are Mrs Margaret McLeish?” said he

She looked at hiue sort of way and nodded ”That's me,” said she ”Is it pay for the cart you're after? If that's it, I must walk”

”Had you a son, Mrs McLeish?” said the htened a little

”And as his na?”