whirled clear around and fell on his face, striking two small pieces of board lying near the sidewalk and loosening a plank in the sidewalk itself.

"Oh!" gasped the man's voice.

Before Jerry could stir he heard a clink as of metal falling on board. He half turned on his back and looked dazedly up at the man, who was pressing both hands into the pit of his stomach. His face was very red. He spoke to Jerry hesitatingly, as though he could not get his breath.

'Are you—hurt—much?"

"N-no, I guess not," Jerry replied, sitting up and feeling of a bruised place on his arm.

"You just about knocked the breath out of me," said the man in a more natural voice and one which Jerry now recognized as belonging to Harry Barton, the clerk at the corner drug store.

"I'm sorry, Mr. Barton. If I'd of seen you—"

"You wouldn't have run into me," finished Mr. Barton. "Of course not. There are a lot of things we wouldn't do if we could see what the results were going to be. Why, bless me, it's Jerry Elbow! Well, I guess there wasn't much harm done this time. You seemed to be in quite a hurry. Have I delayed you?"

"Yes, sir, I was in a hurry," Jerry answered. "Danny was running to ask Mother 'Larkey for fifty cents to see the circus."

"And what were you running for?"

Jerry started to get up as he replied.

"To see if she had fifty cents for Da—"

He stopped speaking and stopped getting up at the same time. A glint of silver on the sidewalk back of Mr. Barton caught his eye. It was a half-dollar! Jerry sank to a sitting posture and gazed in rapt wonder at this answer to an unsaid prayer.

"You are hurt!" cried Mr. Barton solicitously and stooped to help Jerry up. "Where does it pain you?"

"It's fifty cents!" cried Jerry, his lips unsealed at last, and he scrambled eagerly for the coin.

"Well, there's nothing very painful in that, is there?" laughed Mr. Barton.

Jerry rose, clutching the dirty half-dollar tightly, a light of joyful anticipation in his eyes.

"There's not much need of asking what you will spend it for," observed the drug clerk.

"For a ticket to the circus!" cried Jerry, his eyes sparkling at the thought of future delights.

"I guessed it the first time," said Mr. Barton. "I thought I heard something metallic fall on the sidewalk when you ran into me, but I had such hard work getting my breath back that I forgot all about it."

Such a harrowing thought now popped into Jerry's mind that unconsciously he closed his fingers entirely around the precious half-dollar. What if it were Mr. Barton's! Perhaps he had knocked it out of Mr. Barton's pocket when he ran into him. He had heard the clink of its fall just after the collision, as he lay on the ground.

After a short but sharp struggle with himself, Jerry looked up and held out the money to Mr. Barton. He tried to smile, but was conscious that the twisting of his lips didn't look much like a smile.

"It's yours, I guess, Mr. Barton."

"Mine!" exclaimed the surprised drug clerk. "You saw it first."

"Yes, but I heard it fall just after I ran into you. I must of knocked it out of your pocket. I didn't have no half-dollar."

"No more did I," replied Mr. Barton.

"You didn't!" exclaimed Jerry, and joy came unbidden back into his eyes and there was a very different feel to his lips. He knew that it was a real smile this time.

"Not this late in the week," Mr. Barton informed him. "It's too long after pay day for me to have that much money. I've got just thirty-five cents."

He drew some small coins out of his pocket.

"Yes, it's all here. The half-dollar must have been lying on one of the boards that you struck in falling. Let's see it."

He took the money and examined it.

"It was almost covered with dirt," he said. "So was one end of both boards. Hello! That's a funny black mark on the other side. Looks as though somebody had smeared it with black paint."

"That doesn't hurt it any, does it?" asked Jerry in trepidation.

"Not a bit! It's good for a ticket to the circus."

"If I hadn't of run into you, I wouldn't get to go," observed Jerry.

"That's so," responded Mr. Barton. "I wouldn't let any one know you found the money. Just sneak off to the circus when it comes and buy your ticket. Danny would find some way to get it away from you if he knew you had it."

"I guess mebbe he would," Jerry responded.

"You just keep it to yourself and enjoy the circus," Mr. Barton advised him and went on to the store.

Jerry trudged slowly back toward Mrs. Mullarkey's, thinking intently.

The gloom that pervaded the house was so deep that Jerry perceived it as soon as he opened the door. Danny sat glowering by the window; Celia Jane was weeping unashamed, while Chris and Nora were trying not to show their disappointment.

So Mother 'Larkey had not yet been able to make both ends meet—those troublesome, refractory ends that made her life a continual round of hard work—and there were no fifty-cent pieces for the children to buy tickets with to see the elephant jump the fence. Jerry hugged himself just to feel the half-dollar in his blouse pocket and a glow of exultation ran over his body at the thought that he was going to get to see the circus.

Mrs. Mullarkey, looking tired and worn, was ripping apart the dress for Mrs. Green that she had just finished at noon. Baby Kathleen sat at her feet, playing with the old rag doll that had once been Nora's and was now claimed by Celia Jane.

Jerry entered the room slowly and took a seat on the chair without a back. He said nothing at all and finally Mother 'Larkey looked up at him.

"Why don't you ask for fifty cents, too?" she inquired. "Don't you want to see the circus?"

"Yes'm," replied Jerry, "but I ain't got no mother."

"What difference does that make?" she asked, in a voice sharper than she was accustomed to use in speaking to Jerry. "Haven't I done everything a mother could—"

"Yes'm," Jerry interrupted hastily, for he didn't want her to think he thought that. "But it said to ask your mother for fifty cents and I ain't got none to ask."

"Sure and you haven't, you blessed boy," said Mother 'Larkey. "If I had it to give, you wouldn't need a mother to ask it of. I wish I could send all of you to the circus and go myself."

"We never get to go no place," muttered Danny gloomily.

"It costs money to go to places," his mother explained, "and there's no money in the house. It's all I've been able to do to put enough food in your hungry mouths to keep soul and body together and to get enough clothes to keep you looking decent and respectable. I was counting on some money from Mrs. Green to-day, to buy a little meat for supper and get some more cough medicine for Kathleen, but she wasn't satisfied with the dress and I've got to do part of it over before she will pay me."

"Is Kathleen's cough medicine all gone?" Jerry asked, suddenly feeling hot and uncomfortable.

"Yes, and she ought to have some more right this minute. Summer coughs are bad things for babies."

Jerry went to Kathleen and she welcomed him by raising her arms and gurgling at him. He put his face gently against hers and she patted his head and tugged at his hair.

And all the time Jerry felt guiltier and guiltier and the half-dollar in his pocket seemed to become bigger and heavier. He was relieved when he heard Celia Jane, recovered from her crying, asking:

"Did you ever see a circus, Mother?"

"Yes, once. Dan took me to