Jerry's Reward

naughty children, for in summer when they played on the common she could hear their young voices and it was company for her. Now all she could see was a bare brown waste with never a child in sight.

When Paddy was there bending over his ash heaps she didn't care, for every little while he would look up from his work, and wave his hand, and that was all she wanted.

Things got very desperate with the Paddys. Money became so scarce that they couldn't buy coal, but had to use half-burned cinders from the common instead. Peggy declared that they made a "real hot fire," and she would joke about their large coal cellar--meaning the common--"that never got empty--only fuller and fuller."

Paddy would come in shivering and shaking in his threadbare coat.

"And are you frozen entirely?" she would ask.

And he would answer: "I was mortal cold, but the sight of your gentle face has warmed my blood. Faith, it's better than all the fires!"

Whenever the sun came out she would make him