"Where's your boy, Mrs.Nevins ?" he said.

The woman glanced around her.
"I--I'm not just sure, preacher." "Have you seen him since six o'clock ?" "No--I--I ain't," the woman answered.

There was something in John's face which terrified her, though the mere absence of her son gave her no uneasiness.
"Go back, Helen," he said, quickly,--"go as far as that second house, or I shall not feel sure you are safe.

Mrs.Nevins, we must look for Charley.

I am afraid--he was in the lumber-yard this afternoon"-- John did not wait to hear the woman's shriek; he turned and ran from group to group, looking for the boy whom he had seen building block houses on the pile of sawdust; but the mother, pushing her baby into a neighbor's arms, ran up and down like a mad woman.
"My boy!" she cried; "Charley! Charley! He's in the fire,--my boy's in the fire!" Tom Davis had heard the hurried words of the preacher, and the mother's cries roused all the manhood drink had left.