and after three faints they turned her off. It interrupted the work
and made the girls lose time running to her, and so she had to go.
After a while--I was away at the time--the woman she lived with turned
her out. She owed room rent, a good deal of it, and she needed food
and clothes, and there was no money with which to buy them. It got her
crazy, the thought that because she had done wrong she was but a rag to
be kicked from place to place with only the gutter to land in at last,
and--well, she landed. But she isn't all bad. I used to feel about
girls like her just as most good people still feel, but I've come to
see there's many of them who are more sinned against than sinning. The
men who make and keep them what they are go free and are let alone."

"Couldn't she have gone home? You said she was from the country.
Wouldn't they let her come back home?"

Mrs. Mundy shook her head. "Her own mother was dead and her stepmother
wouldn't let her come. She had young children of her own. Last month
she tried to end it all. She won't be here much longer. The doctor
says she'll hardly live six months. If we can get her in the City
Home--"

"The City Home!" The memory of what I had seen there came over me
protestingly. The girl had lived in hell. She need not die in it.
"Perhaps she can be sent somewhere in the country," I said, after a
while. "Mr. Guard might know of some one who will take her. Certainly
she can stay here until--until he knows what is best to do."

Mrs. Mundy got up. For a moment she looked at me, started to say
something, then went out of the room. She was crying. I wonder if I
said anything I shouldn't.