people living gracious and worth-while lives, was not for her; she was
chained to a scrub-pail in a coal-camp. Things had got so much worse
since the death of her mother, she said. Her voice had become dull and
hard--Hal thought that he had never heard a young voice express such
hopelessness.

"You've never been anywhere but here?" he asked.

"I been in two other camps," she said--"first the Gordon, and then East
Run. But they're all alike."

"But you've been down to the towns?"

"Only for a day, once or twice a year. Once I was in Sheridan, and in a
church I heard a lady sing."

She stopped for a moment, lost in this memory. Then suddenly her voice
changed--and he could imagine in the darkness that she had tossed her
head defiantly. "I'll not be entertainin' company with my troubles! Ye
know how tiresome that is when ye hear it from somebody else--like my
next-door neighbour, Mrs. Zamboni. D' ye know her?"

"No," said Hal.

"The poor old lady has troubles enough, God knows. Her man's not much
good--he's troubled with the drink; and she's got eleven childer, and
that's too many for one woman. Don't ye think so?"

She asked this with a naivete which made Hal laugh. "Yes," he said, "I
do."