was the staccato tap of crutches on the bare floor of the hall. The knob of the door turned. 

 "Father," came in a small boy's voice from the doorway, "I brung yuh a toad. I want youse to bless it. It's dead. It was a cripple, too. I found it all mashed. You'll bless it? Me an' the fellers is going to bury it. Ain't it cute?" 

 The Doctor had not turned. 

 "Come in, little Saint Sebastian," said Father McGowan. The little boy gave him a look that was pathetically adoring. His crutches tapped across the bare floor. Opposite the Doctor, he looked at him. Suddenly he screamed. 

 "Gawd! My Gawd! Oh, Father McGowan,—don't—let him have me!"  He clung to Father McGowan's cassock as he sobbed out his broken prayer.  "Don't, Mister, don't!" he ended weakly. Father McGowan picked him up. He looked at the Doctor. 

 "Go," he said. 

 Father McGowan again settled back of a bare table. A little boy sobbed in his arms. "Will you forgive me, little Saint Sebastian?" asked Father McGowan. The child's arms tightened around his neck. Father McGowan coughed. 

 "We're going to have some pink ice cream," he said after an interval.  "Now here's my hanky. Gentlemen don't wipe their noses on their sleeves!" 

 "Will—will yuh bless the toad?" asked the child, after a damp smearing of Father McGowan's handkerchief.  "He was a cripple. Ain't he cute, now?" he added in a tender, little voice. Then he brightened and said loudly, "But I'm glad he's dead, for they ain't no Father McGowan toads to be good to little toad-cripples!" 

 Father McGowan coughed, and tightened his arms about Sebastiano Santo of the slums. 

 

 "Oh, dearest Paw—I mean Papa!" said Cecilia. She clung to him. The lights of the New York station blurred through her tears. Then she veered away from him, and gathered Johnny close. 

 "Aw," he said, "cut it! There's one of the fellows over there."  But "one of the fellows" faced the other direction, Johnny saw, and he allowed himself to hug Celie quickly. He was glad to see her, but he felt a vague resentment toward her because her coming made his throat so stuffy. He remembered the time when he used to sit on her lap and eat bread spread thickly with molasses. He didn't know quite why he 

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