taken into a passenger coach."

"I do think," cried Bess, "that this is the very meanest railroad that ever was. I am sure that Linda Riggs' father owns it. To keep a poor, dear, little dog like that, freezing and starving, in an old baggage car."

"Do you know President Riggs, Miss?" interrupted the baggage-man.

"Why—" began Bess, but her chum interposed before she could go further.

"We know Mr. Riggs' daughter very well. She goes to school where we do, at Lakeview Hall. She was on this train till it was split at the Junction, last evening."

"Well, indeed, Miss, you tell that to Mr. Carter. If you are friends of Mr. Riggs' daughter, maybe he'll stretch a point and let you take the dog into the Pullman. I don't suppose anybody will object at a time like this."

"How could you, Nan?" demanded Bess, in a whisper. "Playing up Linda
Riggs' name for a favor?"

"Not for ourselves, no, indeed!" returned Nan, in the same low tone. "But for the poor doggy, yes."

"Say! I wonder what she'd say if she knew?"

"Something mean, of course," replied Nan, calmly. "But we'll save that poor dog if we can. Come on and find this Conductor Carter."

They left the puppy yelping after them as they returned to the Pullman. The cars felt colder now and the girls heard many complaints as they walked through to the rear. The conductor, the porter said, had gone back into the smoking car. That car was between the Pullman and the day coaches.

When Nan rather timidly opened the door of the smoking car a burst of sound rushed out, almost startling in its volume—piercing cries of children, shrill tones of women's voices, the guttural scolding of men, the expostulations of the conductor himself, who had a group of complainants about him, and the thunderous snoring of a fat man in the nearest seat, who slept with his feet cocked up on another seat and a handkerchief over his face.

"Goodness!" gasped Bess, pulling back. "Let's not go in. It's a bear garden."

"Why, I don't understand it," murmured Nan. "Women and children in the smoker? Whoever heard the like?"

"They've turned off the heat in the other two cars and made us all come in here, lady," explained a little dark-haired and dark-eyed woman who sat in a seat near the door. "They tell us there is not much coal, and they cannot heat so many cars."

She spoke without complaint, in the tone of resignation so common among the peasantry of Europe, but heard in North America from but two people—the French Canadian and the peon of Mexico. Nan had seen so many of the former people in the Big Woods of Upper Michigan the summer before, that she was sure this poor woman was a "Canuck." Upon her lap lay a delicate, whimpering, little boy of about two years.

"What is the matter with the poor little fellow, madam?" asked Nan, compassionately.

"With my little Pierre, mademoiselle?" returned the woman.

"Yes," said Nan.

"He cries for food, mademoiselle," said the woman simply. "He has eaten nothing since we left the Grand Gap yesterday at three o'clock; except that the good conductor gave us a drink of coffee this morning. And his mother has nothing to give her poor Pierre to eat. It is sad, is it not?"

CHAPTER VI

A SERIOUS PROBLEM

The chums from Tillbury looked at each other in awed amazement. Nothing just like this had ever come to their knowledge before. The healthy desire of a vigorous appetite for food was one thing; but this child's whimpering need and its mother's patient endurance of her own lack of food for nearly twenty-four hours, shook the two girls greatly.

"Why, the poor little fellow!" gasped Nan, and sank to her knees to place her cheek against the pale one of the little French boy.

"They—they're starving!" choked Bess Harley.

The woman seemed astonished by the emotion displayed by these two schoolgirls. She looked from Nan to Bess in rather a frightened way.

"Monsieur, the conductor, say it cannot ver' well be help'," she murmured. "It is the snow; it haf overtaken us."

"It just can be helped!" cried Bess, suddenly, and she whirled and fairly ran forward into the chair car. Nan did not notice her chum's departure at the moment. The baby had seized her finger and was smiling at her. Such a pretty little fellow, but so weak and ill in appearance.

"Oh, madame!" Nan cried in her best French, "is it not terrible? We may be here for hours."

"As the good God wills," said the woman, patiently. "We cannot devise or shape Fate, mademoiselle."

Nan stood up and shook her head, saying vigorously, and in her own tongue, for she was too much moved to remember Mademoiselle Loro's teaching:

"But we need not accept Fate's determination as final, I am sure! There is a good God, as you say, madam. This child must have food, and—"

At the moment Bess rushed in carrying the paste-board box containing the remains of their lunch. "Here!" she cried, dramatically. "Give the poor little fellow this."

"Oh, little ladies!" responded the woman, "have a care. You will have need of this food yourselves."

"No, no!" cried Bess, the impetuous. "We are stuffed to repletion.
Aren't we, Nan?"

"We have certainly eaten much more recently than madam and the little one," agreed Nan, heartily.

The woman opened the box. The child sat up with a crow of delight. The mother gave him one of the stale crullers, and he began gnawing on it with all the gusto of a hungry dog on a bone.

"Take something yourself, madam," commanded Nan. "And more for the little fellow."

"Let 'em have it all, Nan," whispered the impulsive Bess. "Goodness! we can get on somehow."

But Nan was more observant than her chum. There were other children in the car besides this little fellow. In fact, in the seat but one behind the French woman and her baby, a girl of six or seven years was clinging to the seat-back and staring with hungry eyes at the broken food in the box.

"Gracious!" gasped Bess, seeing this little one when Nan had nudged her and pointed. "Gracious! that's the picture of Famine, herself."

She seized one of the greasy little pies and thrust it into the child's hands. The latter began devouring it eagerly. Bess saw other hungry mouths open and eager hands outstretched.

"Oh, Nan!" she almost sobbed. "We've got to give them all some. All the poor little children!"

Her chum did not try to curb Bess Harley's generosity. There was not much of the food left, so there was no danger of over-feeding any of the small children who shared in the generosity of the chums. But when the last crumb was gone they found the conductor at their elbows.

"Well, girls!" he exclaimed grimly. "Now you've done it, haven't you?"

"Done what, sir?" asked Bess, rather startled.

"You've given away all your own lunch. What did I tell you? I warned you to take care of it."

"Oh, sir!" cried Nan. "We couldn't have eaten it, knowing that these little folks were so hungry."

"No, indeed!" agreed Bess.

"If you had remained in your own car," the conductor said, "you would have known nothing about these poor kiddies."

"Well, I'm glad we did find out about 'em before we ate our lunch all up," declared