Two or three by-standers,
watching with a kind of pleased curiosity, completed the scene, most
sordid in its setting, there under the flicker of a gas-light on the
corner.
"Hm! What now?" thought Gabriel, stopping to watch the little tragedy.
"More trouble, eh? It's trouble all up and down the line, for these poor
devils! Nothing but trouble for the slave-class. Well, well, let's see
what's wrong _now_!"
Gabriel turned down the alley, drew near the little group, and halted.
"What's wrong?" he asked, in the tone of authority he knew how to use;
the tone which always overbore his outward aspect, even though he might
have been clad in rags; the tone which made men yield to him, and women
look at him with trustful eyes, even as the Billionaire's daughter had
looked.
"Search _me_!" murmured one of the men, shrugging his shoulders. "_I_
can't git nothin' out o' her. She's been sittin' here, cryin', a few
minutes, that's all I know; an' she won't say nothin' to nobody.
"Any of you men know anything about it?" demanded Gabriel, looking at
the rest.
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