from the neighboring counters rushed to pick her up; but, to their
alarm, though she strove to be brave, when they attempted to move her
she could not repress a low moan of anguish. The superintendent sent
at once for a doctor, who discovered that she had sustained a severe
injury, having struck against the edge of one of the iron steps.

Where was now the proud home-coming? Ellie was taken to the hospital,
whither frightened Mrs. Connors was summoned. Upon one of the cots in
the accident ward lay the child, her small face wan with pain, and in
her eyes the startled expression noticeable in those of a person who
has had a serious fall. In one feverish hand she held something
tightly clasped--something for which she had asked before being carried
from the store. When the doctor turned aside she beckoned to her
mother, and, with a pathetic little smile, folded into the palm of the
weeping woman a small yellow envelope. The next moment she fainted
away, Mrs. Connors' tears flowed faster as she beheld the precious
offering--Ellie's first wages, and the last which she was likely ever
to earn.

The firm of McNaughton & Co. investigated the accident, to see if they
could by any means be liable to an action for damages brought by an
employee. But there was no loose nail in the stairway, not the least
obstruction. The proprietors were not to blame; it was simply the
child's heedlessness, they said. In fact, the fault was with Ellie's
shoes: the sole of one, being broken, caught on the top step and caused
her fall.

And she was to have had a new pair that very evening. Mrs. Connors had
quietly determined that her first earnings should be expended in this
way. Poor Ellie! she would not need shoes now: the doctors feared she