Since that time she had lived alone— always
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alone except for the memories of the past. Her
gift with her needle enabled her to make enough
to keep body and soul together. But her heart
hungered for that it had lost.
Of late her memories had gone back much
to her girlhood; when she had walked among
the fruit trees with the lambs frisking and the
birds singing about her. She had bought the
mocking-bird to sing to her. It bore her back to
the time when her lover had walked beside her ;
and there had been no thought of war, with its
blood and its graves. She tried to blot out that
dreadful time; to obliterate it from her mem-
ory; to bridge it over, except for the memory of
her child— with its touch, its voice, its presence.
Always that called her, and she prayed — if she
only might find its grave.
For this she had come back once more to the
place where she had left it, and where she knew
its grave was. She had not found it; but had
put flowers on many unmarked little mounds;
and had blessed with her tender eyes many un-
known little crippled children.
The mention of the crippled girl had opened

her heart. And now when she lifted her head

she was ra some sort comforted. She rose and

took up her bundle, and once more went down

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TWO PEISONERS

into the street. She determined to go and see
the little crippled child who had let her bird go.
