"We haven't got a spare room, but--I'm quick at learnin' tunes.

She could bunk in with me for a night or two." Gray eyed the speaker suspiciously, but it was evident that she was in sober earnest, and the tragedy of such profound ignorance smote the man sharply.

Here was a girl of at least average intelligence and of sensitive makeup; a girl with looks, too, in spite of her size, and no doubt a full share of common sense--perhaps even talents of some sort--yet with the knowledge of a child.

For the first time he realized what playthings of Fate are men and women, how completely circumstance can make or mar them, and what utter paralysis results from the strangling grip of poverty.
History hints that during the Middle Ages there flourished an association known as Comprachicos--"child-buyers"-- which traded in children.

The Comprachicos bought little human beings and disfigured their features, distorted their bodies, fashioned them into ludicrous, grotesque, or hideous monstrosities for king and populace to laugh at, and then resold them.