Lo, Michael! | Page 6

courage. There was also in his glance the gentle harmlessness and appeal of the winged thing that has been caught.
"Well, youngster, you had a pretty close shave," said the doctor jovially, "but you'll pull through all right! You feel comfortable now?"
The nurse was professionally quiet.
"Poor wee b'y!" murmured Morton, her eyes drenched again.
The boy looked from one to another doubtfully. Suddenly remembrance dawned upon him and comprehension entered his glance. He looked about the room and toward the door. There was question in his eyes that turned on the doctor but his lips formed no words. He looked at Morton, and knew her for the nurse of his baby. Suddenly he smiled, and that smile seemed to light up the whole room, and filled the heart of Morton with joy unspeakable. It seemed to her it was the smile of her own lost baby come back to shine upon her. The tears welled, up and the blue lakes ran over. The boy's face was most lovely when he smiled.
"Where is--de little kid?" It was Morton whose face he searched anxiously as he framed the eager question, and the woman's intuition taught her how to answer.
"She's safe in her own wee crib takin' her morning nap. She's just new over," answered the woman reassuringly.
Still the eyes were not satisfied.
"Did she"--he began slowly--"get--hurted?"
"No, my bairnie, she's all safe and sound as ever. It was your own self that saved her life."
The boy's face lit up and he turned from one to another contentedly. His smile said: "Then I'm glad." But not a word spoke his shy lips.
"You're a hero, kid!" said the doctor huskily. But the boy knew little about heroes and did not comprehend.
The nurse by this time had donned her uniform and rattled up starchily to take her place at the bedside, and Morton and the doctor went away, the doctor to step once more into the lady's room below to see if she was feeling quite herself again after her faint.
The nurse leaned over the boy with a glass and spoon. He looked at it curiously, unknowingly. It was a situation entirely outside his experience.
"Why don't you take your medicine?" asked the nurse.
The boy looked at the spoon again as it approached his lips and opened them to speak.
"Is--"
In went the medicine and the boy nearly choked, but he understood and smiled.
"A hospital?" he finished.
The nurse laughed.
"No, it's only a house. They brought you in, you know, when you were hurt out on the steps. You saved the little girl's life. Didn't you know it?" she said kindly, her heart won by his smile.
A beautiful look rewarded her.
"Is de little kid--in this house?" he asked slowly, wonderingly. It was as if he had asked if he were in heaven, there was so much awe in his tone.
"Oh, yes, she's here," answered the nurse lightly. "Perhaps they'll bring her in to see you sometime. Her father's very grateful. He thinks it showed wonderful courage in you to risk your life for her sake."
But Mikky comprehended nothing about gratitude. He only took in the fact that the beautiful baby was in the house and might come there to see him. He settled to sleep quite happily with an occasional glad wistful glance toward the door, as the long lashes sank on the white cheeks, for the first sleep the boy had ever taken in a clean, white, soft bed. The prim nurse, softened for once from her precise attention to duties, stood and looked upon the lovely face of the sleeping child, wondered what his life had been, and how the future would be for him. She half pitied him that the ball had not gone nearer to the vital spot and taken him to heaven ere he missed the way, so angel-like his face appeared in the soft light of the sick room, with the shining gold hair fluffed back upon the pillow now, like a halo.

CHAPTER II
Little Starr Endicott, sleeping in her costly lace-draped crib on her downy embroidered pillow, knew nothing of the sin and hate and murder that rolled in a great wave on the streets outside, and had almost touched her own little life and blotted it out. She knew not that three notable families whose names were interwoven in her own, and whose blood flowed in her tiny veins represented the great hated class of the Rich, and that those upon whom they had climbed to this height looked upon them as an evil to be destroyed; nor did she know that she, being the last of the race, and in her name representing them all, was hated most of all.
Starr Delevan Endicott! It was graven upon her tiny pins and locket, upon the circlet of gold that jewelled her finger, upon her brushes and