Wolfe stammered, glanced appealingly at Mitchell, who saw the
soul of the thing, he knew. But the cool, probing eyes were
turned on himself now,--mocking, cruel, relentless.

"Not hungry for meat," the furnace-tender said at last.

"What then? Whiskey?" jeered Kirby, with a coarse laugh.

Wolfe was silent a moment, thinking.

"I dunno," he said, with a bewildered look. "It mebbe. Summat
to make her live, I think,--like you. Whiskey ull do it, in a
way.

The young man laughed again. Mitchell flashed a look of disgust
somewhere,--not at Wolfe.

"May," he broke out impatiently, "are you blind? Look at that
woman's face! It asks questions of God, and says, 'I have a
right to know,' Good God, how hungry it is!"

They looked a moment; then May turned to the mill-owner:--

"Have you many such hands as this? What are you going to do
with them? Keep them at puddling iron?"

Kirby shrugged his shoulders. Mitchell's look had irritated
him.