"His blood be on old Purdy's head, then!" says O'Connor. "The mine boss
has said he will put her out in the street. She's already months back in
her rent."

Trueman passes on as if he has not heard O'Connor, who is at the Court
House as one of the witnesses.

As the young lawyer pushes his way into the court room his quick glance
catches the bent form of the woman in the front seat, clad in the
cheapest of black, and the open-eyed boy at her side.

The proceedings are short. Trueman sits down at one of the tables inside
the bar enclosure and hastily dashes off an affidavit containing the
facts he has discovered, and a formal motion to dismiss. The Judge hears
the motion, which is opposed to in a half-hearted way by the lawyer on
the other side. The suit is dismissed.

When she is finally made to understand what has happened, the widow
burst into tears. The boy, at sight of his mother's distress, sets up a
wailing that echoes through the whole Court House. In the hallway, the
bunch of miners from Shaft Fifteen gather about the weeping woman as she
comes out. One more instance of the heartlessness of the law which is
made by the men elected by the Coal Barons, is brought home to them.

To these ignorant men, to whom the first principle of self-preservation
is that limit of erudition set by the coal barons themselves, whose
first and last lessons in life are to read correctly the checks of the
time-keeper and the figures on the "company store" checks which they
receive in payment for their work, what difference does it make that the