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MR. MARTIN SHANKS: GUARDIAN.
97

Dido, in a few simple words, frankly told Maggie all that had befallen her since her arrest. She did not omit her rash attempt to commit suicide, and Richard's timely intervention.

Meanwhile Richard had taken a glance about the little bare room.

A plain, single-board table, covered with a bit of badly worn oilcloth, had been pulled out into the room, and they now sat around it. A little low oil lamp, with a broken chimney—which had been patched with a scrap of paper—was the only light in the room. Dick carefully slipped a paper bill under the newspaper which lay on the table where Margaret had flung it when she came to open the door for them.

A small stove stood close to the wall, and on it was a tin coffee pot and an iron tea-kettle with a broken spout.

Above the stove was a little shelf, which