Cinder Path Tales

QUEERED THE "MILE" 59 I hope the story I am about to tell will not be thought to reflect on her, andit will not, unless I bungle badly in the telling of it. Now, I do not, ofcourse, defend the "queer­ ing" of a race, and Kitty as surely put a contestant out of winning place asif she had used a drug, yet it was not done for money. The mandid not deserve towin, and I con­ fess I like her all the better forthe deed. Kitty's fatherhad come from an Oldham factory, thinking, like many another, that in America he would own his mill within a five year. The fiveyears hadpassed, andhe was still running hiseight looms in the big weave-shed by the river, where he first went to work. Kitty had tended her five looms by his side for a year or so, and then found more conge­ nial aswell as more remunerative surroundings in a little store near the academy grounds. This store occupied the lower story of a dwelling-house, which had been built out toward the street, until its wooden porch infringed on the sidewalk, and its flight of long steps rose from theedge of the gutter. Whether it fractured any of the town ordinances by preempting the sidewalk in this way I do not know, butit had a particularly inviting appearance,like a host coming half way to meet you, and the porch, sheltering