Theodore was still unconscious when he was lifted into the ambulance the night before, but on the way to the hospital he opened his eyes, wondering much to find himself flat on his back and being driven rapidly through the streets. In a few minutes he remembered what had happened, and guessed that he must have been stunned by a blow or a fall. As he reached this conclusion, the vehicle stopped, and he was lifted out and carried into the hospital in spite of his protests. He had a dread of entering a hospital as a patient, and he wanted to go home.
But the doctors would not allow him to go home. They told him that if he would be quiet and do as they said, he would probably be able to go home the next morning, and with this promise he was obliged to be content, and allow himself to be undressed and put to bed. He was badly bruised and his right shoulder was very lame, but there was no serious injury, and it seemed to the boy very trying to be compelled to spend the night where he was. He did not sleep much, partly because of his strange surroundings, and partly because of his aching head and shoulder, and as he lay there in the dimly-lighted ward, his thoughts were busy.
A hot anger burned in his heart as he recalled the cowardly attack in the dark alley. He saw that it had been deliberately planned by Dick Hunt, and that the four boys must have followed him from the corner where he saw them.
"I'll pay that Dick Hunt for this," he muttered under his breath, "an' Carrots, too. I know the chap that hit so hard was Carrots. I'll make 'em suffer for it!"
He lay there, his eyes flashing and his cheeks burning, as he thought over various schemes of vengeance. Then suddenly he thought of Mr. Scott, and that brought something else to his remembrance. He seemed to see his teacher holding out his little Bible and making him--Theodore--read aloud those two verses:
"Dearly beloved avenge not yourselves."
And "Recompense to no man evil for evil."
As he repeated these words to himself, the fire died slowly out of the boy's eyes and the angry colour faded from his cheeks. He turned restlessly in his bed and tried to banish these thoughts and bring back his schemes of vengeance, but he could not do it. He knew what was the right--what he ought to do--but he was not willing to do it. Hour after hour he argued the matter with himself, finding all sorts of reasons why, in this case, he might take vengeance into his own hands and "learn that Dick Hunt a lesson," yet feeling and knowing in the depths of his heart that whatever the old Tode Bryan might have done, Theodore Bryan, who was trying to be the bishop's shadow, certainly had no right to do evil to somebody else simply because that somebody had done evil to him.
It was nearly morning before the long battle with himself was over, but it ended at last, and it was Theodore, and not Tode who was victorious, and it was the memory of the bishop's face, and of the bishop's prayer that day in the poorhouse, that finally settled the matter.
"He'd fight for somebody else, the bishop would, but he wouldn't ever fight for himself, an' I mustn't neither," the boy murmured, softly, and then with a long breath he turned his face to the wall and fell asleep, and he had but just awakened from that sleep when Mr. Scott, with Tag under his arm, came through the long corridor to the ward where Theodore was lying in the very last cot, next the wall.
Mr. Scott had promised not to let the dog out of his arms, but if he had been better acquainted with Tag he would never have made such a rash promise. As the gentleman followed the nurse into the ward, the dog's eyes flashed a swift glance over the long line of cots, and the next instant something dark went flying down the room and up on to that last cot in the row, and there was Tag licking his master's face and hands, and wagging his tail, and barking like mad.
"Dear me!" exclaimed the nurse, running toward the corner. "This will never do. He'll drive the patients into fits! Why didn't you keep hold of him?"
She threw the question back in a reproachful tone to Mr. Scott.
He laughed a little as he answered, "If you will try to pick him up now and hold him, you will understand why."
Even as he spoke, the nurse was making an attempt to capture and silence the noisy little fellow. She might as well have tried to pick up a ball of quicksilver. Tag slipped through her fingers like an eel, scurrying from one end of the cot to the other, and barking excitedly all the time.
"Can't you stop him, Theodore?" exclaimed Mr. Scott, as he reached the corner where the boy lay.
"Here, Tag, lie down and be still," cried the boy, and with one last defiant yap at the nurse, Tag nosed aside the bedclothes and snuggled down beside his master with a sigh of glad content.
"Well, if ever I let a dog intomyward again!" exclaimed the nurse, in a tone of stern determination.
"I'm sorry he made such a noise, ma'am. It was only because he was so glad to find me," said Theodore, quickly.
The nurse turned away in offended silence, and Mr. Scott sat down by the bed and began to talk with the boy.
He listened with a grave face to Theo's story. When it was ended, he asked, "Did you recognise either of the boys?"
"Yes, sir; one, certainly, and I think I know one of the others."
"Well?" said the teacher, inquiringly.
Theodore hesitated a moment, then answered in a low tone, "You 'member them verses you showed me that first Sunday, Mr. Scott?"
The gentleman smiled down into the sober, boyish face. "I remember," he replied, "but, Theo, this is a grave matter. To beat a boy until he is unconscious, and then leave him to live or die, is a crime. Such boys ought not to be shielded."
"Mr. Scott, I had an awful time over that last night," answered the boy, earnestly. "I wanted to pay them fellers for this job--you better b'lieve I did, but," he shook his head slowly, "I can't do it. You see, sir, I ain't Tode no more--I'm Theodore, now."
There was a look on the homely, boyish face that forbade further discussion of the matter, and, after a moment's silence, Mr. Scott said in a different tone, "Well, my boy, when are you going home? Nan and the baby want to see you."
Theo glanced impatiently about the long room.
"She said I'd got to stay in bed till the doctor had seen me," he replied, "'n the doctor'll be here 'bout nine o'clock."
"She" was the nurse.
"It's nearly nine now. I'll wait until the doctor comes, then," Mr. Scott said.
The doctor pronounced the boy quite fit to leave the hospital, and his clothes being brought to him, the curtains were drawn around his cot and he dressed himself hastily. But as he pushed aside the curtains, Mr. Scott saw a troubled look on his face, and asked:
"What's the matter, Theodore?"
Without answering the boy crossed the room to the nurse.
"Where's the money that was in my pocket?" he asked, anxiously.
The nurse looked at him sharply. "If there was any money in your pockets when you were brought here it would be in them now," she answered, shortly. "You can go to the office and ask any questions you like."
Theodore turned toward his teacher a very sorrowful face.
"I've been robbed, too," he said.
"Oh, I'm sorry, Theodore. How much have you lost?"
"Five dollars. She says to ask at the office, but 'twon't do no good, I s'pose."
"No, nothing would have been taken from your pockets here, but we will stop at the office and see if we can learn anything," Mr. Scott said.
Tag had kept close to his master's heels, and now at his teacher's suggestion Theodore picked up the dog, who went forth quietly enough in that fashion.
Inquiries at the office convinced the boy that he had been robbed before he was brought there, and naturally enough he came to the conclusion that his money had gone into the pockets of Dick Hunt and his companions.
At the door of the tenement house Mr. Scott left Theo, who hurried eagerly up the stairs. On the landing he met Jimmy Hunt, who called out:
"Hi--o, Tode, where ye been all night? Say, what was the matter? Did Mr. Scott find ye?"
"Yes," was Theo's only response, as he pushed open Nan's door, to be greeted with such a warm welcome that he hardly knew what to say and had to hide his embarrassment by poking the baby's ribs to make him laugh. Jimmy Hunt had followed him into the room and listened with open mouth as well as ears to the brief story that the boy told in reply to Nan's questions.
"Oh, 'twasn't much. I got knocked down an' carried to the hospital, an' they wouldn't let me come away till morning--that's all."
"An' wasn't ye hurt?" cried Jimmy, in a disappointed tone. It seemed to him altogether too tame an affair if nobody was hurt.
"My shoulder's sprained, an' my head was hurt a little," Theo answered. "Say, Jim, where's Dick?"
"I d'know. Out somewheres," replied Dick's brother, indifferently.
"Why ain't you in school, Jimmy?" was Theo's next question.
"Well, I like that!" exclaimed Jimmy, in a tone of deep disgust. "Ain't I been a-racin' all over town for you this mornin', a-gettin' Mr. Scott to hunt ye up, an' goin' ter see 'f your stand's open, an' carryin' things 'round fer Nan, too? How could I do all that an' be in school, I'd like to know?"
"'Deed, you couldn't, Jimmy," replied Nan, soothingly. "I don't know what I should have done this morning without him, Theo. He was my right hand man."
Jimmy coloured with satisfaction at this high praise, and his delight was complete when Theodore added,
"That so? Well now, Jimmy boy, I ain't goin' to forget this."
"Huh! Twarn't nothin'. I liked to do it," replied Jimmy, and then overcome by a sudden and unaccountable fit of bashfulness he ran hastily out of the room.
Then Theodore told Nan the details of his adventure, but not even to her would he tell the name of his enemy, and Nan did not guess, for she would never have imagined that Mrs. Hunt's Dick could have served Theo so.
Dick had gone out as usual after breakfast and did not come home even to get his supper, but of late his habits had been so irregular that nothing was said at home about his absence.
After supper Jimmy was sent out on an errand and Dick met him and questioned him in regard to Theo's return, and what he had to say. Jimmy waxed indignant over the story which he filled in from his own imagination with many vivid details.
"Some fellers pitched into him an' knocked him down an' beat him an' left him for dead an' they took him t' the hospital an' kep' him there all night. Guess them fellers'll suffer for it! They robbed him, too. Took five dollars out o' his pockets."
"They didn't neither!" exclaimed Dick, hastily, thrown off his guard by this unexpected statement.
"Come now, Dick Hunt, mebbe you know more'n I do about it," retorted Jimmy, with withering sarcasm, little suspecting how much more his brotherdidknow. "Mebbe you heard what Nan said to ma 'bout it."
"No, no! 'Course I d'know nothin' 'bout it. How would I know?" replied Dick, quickly and uneasily. "Say, Jimmy, is he--is Tode goin' to have them fellers took up?"
"'Spect he is--I would," answered Jimmy; then remembering his errand, he ran off, leaving Dick looking after him with a haggard, miserable face.
"Robbed," Dick said to himself, as he walked moodily and aimlessly on. "We didn't do that anyhow. Somebody must 'a' gone through his pockets after we cleared out. Nice box I'm in now!"
Dick did not go home at all that night. He was afraid that he might be arrested if he did.
"He knows 'twas me did it, an' he's keepin' dark 'bout it till they can nab me," he thought.
He hunted up the three boys who had been so ready to help him the night before, but he found them now firmly banded together against him. Moreover, they had spread such reports of him among their companions, that Dick found himself shunned by them all. He dared not go home, so he wandered about the streets, eating in out-of-the-way places, and sleeping where he could. One day Carrots told him that Tode Bryan was huntin' everywhere for him. Then Dick, in desperation, made up his mind to go to sea--he could stand the strain no longer. He dared not go home, even to bid his mother goodbye. Dick was selfish and cruel, but he had even yet a little lingering tenderness for his mother. It was not enough to make him behave himself and do what he knew would please her, but it did make him wish that he could see her just for a moment before going away. It was enough to make him creep cautiously to the house after dark, and stand in the shadow, looking up at her window, while he pictured to himself the neat, pleasant room, where at that hour, she would be preparing supper. While he stood there, Theo came out of the house, with Tag, as usual, at his heels. Tag ran over to the dark corner and investigated Dick, but cautiously, for there was no friendship between him and this member of the Hunt family. Dick stood silent and motionless afraid that the dog might bark and draw Theo over there, but he stood ready for flight until Theo whistled and Tag ran back to him, and presently followed him off in another direction. Then, with a breath of relief, Dick stole off into the darkness, and the next day he left the city on a vessel bound for South America, rejoicing that at last he was beyond reach of Tode Bryan.
Dick was not mistaken in thinking that Theo had been searching for him, but he was greatly mistaken as to the boy's purpose in it. Theodore was entirely ready now to obey that command that Mr. Scott had shown him and to do his best to "overcome evil with good." He took it for granted that Dick and the others had robbed as well as beaten him, but all the same, he felt that he was bound to forget all that and find some way to show them a kindness. But though Theo was always on the lookout for him, Dick managed to keep out of his sight while he remained in the city. After Dick had sailed, some boy told Jimmy where his brother had gone, and so at last the news reached Theodore.
Since his return from the bishop's, Theo had had few idle moments, but after losing the five dollars he worked early and late to make up the loss. He grew more silent and thoughtful, and when alone his thoughts dwelt almost continually on that happy day when he should look once more into the bishop's kind face.
"I'll tell him all about it," he would say to himself, "how I saw that Mrs. Russell drop the pocketbook, an' how I slipped under the wagon an' snatched it up out o' the mud, an' used the money. I'll tell it all, an' ev'rything else bad that I can 'member, so he'll know jest what a bad lot I've been, an' then I'll tell him how sorry I am, an' how I'm a-huntin' ev'rywhere for that Jack Finney, an' how I'll keep a-huntin' till I find him."
All this and much more Theodore planned to tell the bishop, and, as he thought about it, it seemed as if he could not wait another hour, so intense was his longing to look once more into that face that was like no other earthly face to him, to listen again to the voice that thrilled his heart, and hear it say, "My boy, I forgive you." Many a time he dreamt of this and started up from sleep with those words ringing in his ears, "My boy, I forgive you," and then finding himself alone in his dark, dismal little room, he would bury his wet cheeks in the pillow and try to stifle the longing in his lonely, boyish heart.
Even Nan, who knew him better than did any one else, never guessed how his heart hungered to hear those words from the lips of the bishop.
But little by little--in nickels and dimes and quarters--Theodore laid by another five dollars. He knew to a penny how much there was, but when he brought the last dime, he and Nan counted it all to make sure. There was no mistake. It amounted to thirty-seven dollars and twenty-five cents, and the boy drew a long, glad breath as he looked up at Nan with shining eyes and flushed cheeks, saying,
"To-morrow, Nan, I can see--him!"
"Don't look so--so awfully glad, Theo. I'm afraid something will happen," said Nan, with a troubled expression in her eyes as she looked at him.
"Don't you worry. I ain't a-goin' to be robbed again--you better believe I ain't!" cried the boy. Then he glanced at his worn suit and tried to pull down his jacket sleeves, as he added, wistfully, "D'you think I look well enough to go there, Nan? I wanted to buy a collar an' necktie, but, I justcouldn'twait any longer."
Nan's private opinion was, that if the bishop could only see Theo's face at that moment, the garments he wore would be a matter of small importance. She answered, quickly,
"You look plenty well enough, Theo. Don't worry about that."
She gathered up the money and put it back into the box in which it had been kept, and the boy went across the room to the bed where the baby lay asleep.
"Seems to me he looks kind o' peaked--don't he, Nan?" he remarked, uneasily.
Nan cast an anxious glance at the little, thin face, and shook her head. "He doesn't get strong as I hoped he would," she answered, sadly.
"Oh well, he will, when it comes warmer, so he can get out doors oftener," the boy said, as he went away to his room.
He hurried through his work the next day, closing his stand at the earliest possible moment, and rushing home to get ready for his visit. He always, now, kept his face and hands scrupulously clean. His hair might have been in better condition if he had had money to buy a comb or a brush, but those were among the luxuries that he felt he must deny himself until he had made all the restitution in his power.
To-day, however, when he went to Nan's room for his money, she offered him the use of her comb, and helped him reduce his rough, thick hair to some kind of order. Even then he looked at himself somewhat doubtfully. His suit was so shabby in spite of Nan's careful mending, and his shoes were worse than his suit, but they were polished to the last degree. He had exchanged a sandwich and two doughnuts for that "shine."
"You look well enough, Theo," Nan said, "plenty well enough. Now go on, and oh, I dohopeit will be all right."
"I know 'twill," cried the boy, joyously, as he tucked the money carefully into an inside pocket. "Oh, Nan!"
He looked at her with such a happy face that her own beamed a bright response. Then he ran off and Nan stood in the doorway watching him as he went down the stairs, closely followed by his inseparable companion, Tag.
"The dear boy! He is fairly pale," said Nan, to herself, as she turned back into her room. "It is strange how he loves that bishop--and what a different boy he is, too, since he came home. I don't see how the bishop can help loving him. Oh, I do hope nothing will happen to spoil his visit. He has looked forward to it so long."
The boy felt as if he were walking on air as he went rapidly through the crowded streets, seeing nothing about him, so completely were his thoughts occupied with the happiness before him. As he got farther up town the crowd lessened, and when he turned into the street on which the bishop lived, the passers-by were few.
At last he could see the house. In a few minutes he would reach it. Then his joyous anticipations suddenly vanished and he began to be troubled.
What if Brown wouldn't let him in, he thought, or--what if the bishop should refuse to see him or to listen to his story?
As these thoughts came to him his eager pace slackened and for a moment he was tempted to turn back. Only for a moment, however. Heknewthat the bishop would not refuse to see him, and as for Brown, if Brown refused to admit him, he would go to the servants' door and ask for Mrs. Martin.
So thinking, he pushed open the iron gate and went slowly up the walk.
"Stay here, Tag. Lie down, sir!" he ordered, and the dog obediently dropped down on the steps, keeping his bright eyes fastened on his master, as the boy rang the bell. Theo could almost hear his heart beat as he waited. Suddenly the door swung open and there was Brown gazing severely at him.
"Well--what doyouwant?" questioned the man, brusquely.
"I want--Don't you know me, Brown? I want to see--Mrs. Martin."
The boy's voice was thick and husky, and somehow he could not utter the bishop's name to Brown standing there with that cold frown on his face.
"Oh--you want to see Mrs. Martin, do you? Well, I think you've got cheek to come here at all after leaving the way you did," Brown growled. He held the door so that the boy could not enter, and seemed more than half inclined to shut it in his face.
"Oh, please, Brown,dolet me in," pleaded the boy, with such a heart-broken tone in his voice, that Brown relented--he wasn't half so gruff as he pretended to be--and answered, grudgingly,
"Well, come in, if you must, an' I'll find out if Mrs. Martin will see you."
With a sudden gleam of joy in his eyes, Theodore slipped in.
"Come along!" Brown called over his shoulder, and the boy followed to the housekeeper's sitting-room. The door of the room stood open, and Mrs. Martin sat by the window with a newspaper in her hand. She glanced up over her spectacles as Brown's tall figure appeared at the door.
"Mrs. Martin, this boy says he wants to see you," he announced, and then sauntered indifferently away to his own quarters.
Mrs. Martin took off her glasses as she called, "Come in, boy, and tell me what you want."
Theo walked slowly toward her hoping that she would recognise him, but she did not. Indeed it was a wonder that Brown had recognised him, so different was his appearance in his rough worn clothes, from that of the handsomely dressed lad, whose sudden departure had so grieved the kindhearted housekeeper.
"Don't you know me, Mrs. Martin?" the boy faltered, sorrowfully, as he paused beside her chair.
"No, I'm sure I--why! You don't mean to say that you are our deaf and dumb boy!" exclaimed the good woman, as she peered earnestly into the grey eyes looking down so wistfully into hers.
"Yes, I'm the bad boy you were so good to, but I've been keepin' straight ever since I was here, Mrs. Martin," he answered, earnestly. "I have, truly."
"Bless your dear heart, child," cried the good woman, springing up hastily and seizing the boy's hands. "I'm sure you have. I guessIknow a bad face when I see one, and it don't look like yours. Sit down, dear, and tell me all about it."
In the fewest possible words Theo told his story, making no attempt to excuse anything. The housekeeper listened with keen interest, asking a question now and then, and reading in his face the confirmation of all he said. He did not say very much about the bishop, but the few words that he did say and the look in his eyes as he said them, showed her what a hold upon the boy's heart her master had so unconsciously gained, and her own interest in the friendless lad grew deeper.
When his story was told, she wiped her eyes as she said, slowly, "And to think that you've been working all these weeks to save up that money! Well, well, how glad the dear bishop will be! He's said all the time that you were a good boy."
"Oh, has he?" cried Theo, his face all alight with sudden joy. "I was afraid he'd think I was all bad when he found out how I'd cheated him."
"No, no!" exclaimed Mrs. Martin. "He was grieved over your going off so, and he has tried his best to find you, but you see he didn't know where to look for you."
"Did he try to find me, Mrs. Martin? Oh, I'm so glad! And can I see him now, please?"
The boy's voice trembled with eagerness as he spoke.
The housekeeper's kind face was full of pity and sympathy as she exclaimed, "Why, my boy, didn't you know? The bishop is in California. He went a week ago to stay three months."
All the glad brightness faded from the boy's face as he heard this. He did not speak, but he turned aside, and brushed his sleeve hastily across his eyes. Mrs. Martin laid her hand gently on his shoulder.
"I'm so sorry," she said, "and he will be too, when he knows of your coming. I will write him all about it."
Still the boy stood silent. It seemed to him that he could not bear it. It had not once occurred to him that the bishop might be away, and now there was no possibility of seeing him for three long months. It seemed an eternity to the boy. And to think that he was there--at home--a week ago!
"If they hadn't stole that five dollars from me, I might 'a' seen him last week," the boy said to himself, bitter thoughts of Dick Hunt rising in his heart. At last he turned again to the housekeeper and at the change in his face her eyes filled with quick tears.
He took from his pocket the little roll of money and held it out, saying in a low unsteady voice, "You send it to him--an' tell him--won't you?"
"I'll write him all about it," the housekeeper repeated, "and don't you be discouraged, dear. He'll want to see you just as soon as he gets home, I know he will. Tell me where you live, so I can send you word when he comes."
In a dull, listless voice the boy gave the street and number, and she wrote the address on a slip of paper.
"Remember, Theodore, I shall write the bishop all you have told me, and how you are trying to find the Finney boy and to help others just as he does," said the good woman, knowing instinctively that this would comfort the boy in his bitter disappointment.
He brightened a little at her words but he only said, briefly,
"Yes--tell him that," and then he went sorrowfully away.
Mrs. Martin stood at the window and looked after him as he went slowly down the street, his hands in his pockets and his eyes on the ground, while Tag, well aware that something was wrong, trotted beside him with drooping ears and tail.
"Tell me that that's a bad boy!" the good woman said to herself. "I know better! I don't care what that Mr. Gibson said. I never took much stock in Mr. Gibson myself, anyhow. He always had something to say against anybody that the bishop took an interest in. There--I wish I'd told Theodore that he was here only as a substitute, and had to leave when the regular secretary was well enough to come back. I declare my heart aches when I think of that poor little fellow's face when I told him that the bishop was gone. Ah well, this is a world of disappointment!" and with a sigh she turned away from the window.
Nan sat in a rocking-chair with Little Brother in her arms, when Theodore opened her door.
"Oh Theo--what is it? What is the matter?" she cried, as she saw his face.
He dropped wearily into a seat and told her in a few words the result of his visit.
"Oh, I am so sorry!" she exclaimed. "And it seems so hard to think that you would have seen the bishop if you hadn't lost that five dollars!"
The boy sighed, but made no reply. He could not talk about it then, and presently he got up and went out.
Theodore went slowly down the stairs, but stopped on the outside steps and stood there with his hands in his pockets looking listlessly up and down the street. There was another big tenement house opposite, and on its steps sat a girl of ten or eleven with a baby in her lap. The baby kept up a low wailing cry, but the girl paid no attention to it. She sat with her head leaning against the house, and seemed to notice nothing about her.
Theodore glanced at her indifferently. His thoughts were still dwelling on his great disappointment--the sorrowful ending of the hopes and longings of so many weeks. It seemed to him that he had now nothing to which to look forward; nothing that was worth working for. Then suddenly there flashed into his mind the words he had heard the bishop speak to a man who came to him one day in great sorrow.
"My life is spoiled," the man had said. "All my hopes and plans are destroyed. What shall I do?"
And the bishop had answered, "My son, you must forget yourself, and your broken hopes and plans, and think of others. Do something for somebody else--and keep on doing."
"That's what he would say to me, I s'pose," thought the boy. "I wonder what I can do. There's Tommy O'Brien, I 'spect he'd be glad 'nough to see most anybody."
He turned and went slowly and reluctantly back up the stairs. He didn't want to see Tommy O'Brien. He didn't want to see anybody just then, but still he went on to Tommy's door. As he approached it, he heard loud, angry voices mingled with the crying of a baby. He knocked, but the noise within continued, and after a moment's pause he pushed open the door and went in.
The three women who lived in the room were all standing with red, angry faces, each trying to outscold the others. Three or four little children, with frightened eyes, were huddled together in one corner, while a baby cried unheeded on the floor, its mother being too much occupied with the quarrel to pay any attention to her child. The women glanced indifferently at Theodore as he entered, and kept on with their loud talk. Theo crossed over to Tommy's cot. The sick boy had pulled his pillow over his head and was pressing it close to his ears to shut out the racket.
"Le'me 'lone!" he exclaimed, as Theodore tried to lift the pillow. His face was drawn with pain and there were dark hollows beneath his heavy eyes. Such a weary, suffering face it was that a great flood of pity surged over Theodore's heart at sight of it. Then Tommy opened his eyes and as he saw who had pulled aside his pillow a faint smile crept around his pale lips.
"Oh!" he cried. "It's you. I thought 'twas some o' them a-pullin' off my piller. Can't you make 'em stop, Tode? They've been a-fightin' off an' on all day." He glanced at the noisy women as he spoke.
"What's the row about?" asked Theo.
"'Cause Mis' Carey said Mis' Green's baby was cross-eyed. Mis' Green got so mad at that that she's been scoldin' 'bout it ever since an' leavin' the baby to yell there by itself on the floor--poor little beggar! Seem's if my head'll split open with all the noise," sighed Tommy, wearily, then he brightened up as he inquired, "What d' you come for, Tode?"
"Just to talk to you a little," replied Theo. "S'pose you get awful tired layin' here all the time, don't ye, Tommy?"
The unexpected sympathy in the voice and look touched the lonely heart of the little cripple. His eyes filled with tears, and he reached up one skinny little hand and laid it on the rough, strong one of his visitor as he answered,
"Oh, you don't know--you don't know anything about it, Tode. I don't b'lieve dyin' can be half so bad's livin' this way. She wishes I'd die. She's said so lots o' times," he nodded toward his aunt, who was one of the women in the room, "an' I wish so too, 'f I've got to be this way always."
"Ain't ye never had no doctor, Tommy?" asked Theo, with a quick catch in his breath as he realised dimly what it would be to have such a life to look forward to.
"No--she says she ain't got no money for doctors," replied the boy, soberly.
"I'll"--began Theodore, then wisely concluding to raise no hopes that might not be realised, he changed his sentence to, "I'll find out if there's a doctor that will come for nothin'. I believe there is one. Can ye read, Tommy?"
The sick boy shook his head. "How could I?" he answered. "Ain't nobody ter show me nothin'."
"Wonder 'f I couldn't," said Theo, thoughtfully. "I c'n tell ye the letters anyhow, an' that'll be better'n nothin'."
A bit of torn newspaper lay on the floor beside the bed. He picked it up and pointed out A, O and S, to Tommy. By the time the little cripple had thoroughly mastered those three letters so that he could pick them out every time, the women had given up their quarrel. Mrs. Green had taken up her baby and was feeding it, and the other women, with sullen faces, had resumed their neglected duties.
"Oh dear! Must you go?" Tommy exclaimed as Theo got off the cot on which he had been sitting. "But you was real good to come, anyhow. When'll ye come again an' tell me some more letters?"
"I'll show ye one ev'ry day if I can get time. Then in three weeks you'll know all the big ones an' some o' the little ones that are just like the big ones. Now don't ye forget them three."
"You bet I won't. I shall say 'em a hundred times 'fore to-morrow," rejoined the little fellow, and his eyes followed his new friend eagerly until the door closed behind him.
As for Theodore himself, half the weight seemed to have been lifted from his own heart as he went down the stairs again.
"I'll run outside a minute 'fore I go to supper," he said to himself. "The air was awful thick in that room. Reckon that's one thing makes Tommy feel so bad."
He walked briskly around two or three squares, and as he came back to the house he noticed that the girl and the baby still sat where he had seen them an hour before. The baby's cry had ceased, but it began again as Theo was passing the two. He stopped and looked at them. The girl's eyes rested on his face with a dull, indifferent glance.
"What makes it cry? Is it sick?" the boy asked, nodding toward the baby.
The girl shook her head.
"What ails it then?"
"Starvin'."
The girl uttered the word in a lifeless tone as if it were a matter of no interest to her.
"Where's yer mother?" pursued the boy.
"Dead."
"An' yer father?"
"Drunk."
"Ain't there nobody to look out for ye?"
Again the girl shook her head.
"Ain't ye had anything to eat to-day?"
"No."
"What d'ye have yesterday?"
"Some crusts I found in the street. Do go off an' le'me 'lone. We're most dead, an' I'm glad of it," moaned the girl, drearily.
"You gi' me that baby an' come along. I'll get ye somethin' to eat," cried Theo, and as the girl looked up at him half doubtfully and half joyfully, he seized the bundle of shawl and baby and hurried with it up to Nan's room, the girl dragging herself slowly along behind him.
Nan cast a doubtful and half dismayed glance at the two strangers as Theodore ushered them in, but the boy exclaimed,
"They're half starved, Nan. Wemustgive 'em somethin' to eat," and when she saw the baby's little pinched face she hesitated no longer, but quickly warmed some milk and fed it to the little one while the girl devoured the bread and milk and meat set before her with a ravenous haste that confirmed what she had said.
Then, refreshed by the food, she told her pitiful story, the old story of a father who spent his earnings in the saloon, leaving his motherless children to live or die as might be. Nan's heart ached as she listened, and Theodore's face was very grave. When the girl had gone away with the baby in her arms, Theo said, earnestly,
"Nan, I've got to earn more money."
"How can you?" Nan asked. "You work so hard now, Theo."
"I must work harder, Nan. I can't stand it to see folks starvin' an' not help 'em. I'll pay you for what these two had you know."
Nan looked at him reproachfully. "Don't you think I want to help too?" she returned. "Do you think I've forgotten that meal you gave Little Brother an' me?"
"That was nothin'. Anyhow you've done lots more for me than ever I did for you," the boy answered, earnestly, "but, Nan, howcanrich folks keep their money for themselves when there are people--babies, Nan--starvin' right here in this city?"
"I suppose the rich folks don't know about them," replied the girl, thoughtfully, as she set the table for supper.
"I've got to talk it over with Mr. Scott," Theo said, as he drew his chair up to the table.
"You talk everything over with Mr. Scott now, don't you, Theo?"
"'Most everything. He's fine as silk, Mr. Scott is. He rings true every time, but he ain't"--
He left his sentence unfinished, but Nan knew of whom he was thinking.
The next afternoon Theodore walked slowly through the business streets, with eyes and ears alert, for some opening of which he might take advantage to increase his income. Past block after block he wandered till he was tired and discouraged. Finally he sat down on some high stone steps to rest a bit, and while he sat there a coloured boy came out of the building. He had a tin box and some rags in his hands, and he began in an idle fashion to clean the brass railing to the steps. Theodore fell into conversation with him, carelessly and indifferently at first, but after a little with a sudden, keen interest as the boy began to grumble about his work.
"I ain't a-goin' ter clean these yer ol' railin's many more times," he said. "It's too much work. I c'n git a place easy where the' ain't no brasses to clean, an' I'm a-goin' ter, too. All the office boys hates ter clean brasses."
"What do ye clean 'em with?" Theodore inquired.
The boy held out the tin box. "This stuff an' soft rags. Say--you want ter try it?"
He grinned as he spoke, but to his surprise his offer was accepted. "Gi' me your rags," cried Theo, and he proceeded to rub and polish energetically, until one side of the railings glittered like gold.
"Yer a gay ol' cleaner!" exclaimed the black boy, as he lolled in blissful idleness on the top step. "Now go ahead with the other rail."
But Theodore threw down the rags.
"Not much," he answered. "I've done half your work an' you can do the other half."
"Oh, come now, finish up the job," remonstrated the other. "'Tain't fair not to, for you've made that one shine so. I'll have ter put an extry polish on the other to match it."
But Theodore only laughed and walked off saying to himself,
"Rather think this'll work first-rate."
He went straight to a store, and asked for "the stuff for shining up brass," and bought a box of it. Then he wondered where he could get some clean rags.
"Per'aps Mrs. Hunt'll have some," he thought, "an' anyhow I want to see Jim."
So home he hastened as fast as his feet would carry him.
Good Mrs. Hunt was still a little cool to Theodore, though she could see for herself how steady and industrious he was now, and how much he had improved in every way; but she had never gotten over her first impression of him, founded not only on his appearance and manners when she first knew him, but also on Dick's evil reports in regard to him. Now that Dick himself had gone so far wrong, his mother went about with a heartache all the time, and found it hard sometimes to rejoice as she knew she ought to do in the vast change for the better in this other boy.
"Is Jim here?" Theodore asked when Mrs. Hunt opened the door in response to his knock.
"Yes--what's wanted, Tode?" Jimmy answered for himself before his mother could reply.
"Can you stay out o' school to-morrow?" Theo questioned.
"No, he can't, an' you needn't be temptin' him," broke in the mother, quickly.
"Oh, come now, ma, wait till ye hear what he wants," remonstrated Jimmy, in whose eyes Theo was just about right.
"I wanted him to run my stand to-morrow," said Theodore. "I've got somethin' else to 'tend to. There's plenty o' fellers that would like to run it for me, but ye see I can't trust 'em an' Icantrust Jim every time."
Jimmy drew himself up proudly. "Oh, ma, do let me stay out an' do it," he cried, eagerly.
"It's Friday, an' we don't have much to do Fridays anyhow, in our school."
"We-ell, I s'pose then you might stay out just this once," Mrs. Hunt said, slowly, being fully alive to the advantages to Jimmy of such a friendly feeling on Theo's part. She recognized Theodore's business ability, and would have been only too glad to see her own boy develop something of the same kind. She was haunted with a dread that he might become idle and vicious as Dick had done.
"All right, then," Theodore responded, promptly. "You be ready to go down with me at seven o'clock, Jim, an' I'll see you started all right before I leave you. Oh, Mrs. Hunt, there's one more thing I want. Have you any clean old rags?"
"For what?"
"Any kind o' soft white cotton stuff or old flannel will do," replied the boy, purposely leaving her question unanswered. "I'll pay you for 'em, of course, if you let me have 'em."
"Well, I guess I ain't so stingy as all that comes to," exclaimed Mrs. Hunt, sharply. "D'ye want 'em now?"
"I'll come for 'em after supper," answered the boy, thinking that it was best to make sure of them, lest he be delayed for want of them in the morning.
When later that evening, he knocked at her door, Mrs. Hunt had the pieces ready for him, and the next morning, Jimmy was waiting in the hall when Theo came from Nan's room with his big basket, and the two boys went down the street carrying the basket between them. As soon as its contents had been arranged as attractively as possible on the clean white marbled oilcloth with which the stand was covered, and the coffee made and ready to serve, Theo handed Jimmy two dollars in dimes, nickels and pennies, to make change, and set off with the box of paste in his pocket, and the roll of rags under his arm.
Jimmy watched him out of sight, and then with a proud sense of responsibility awaited the appearance of his customers.
Theodore walked rapidly on till he reached the business streets where most of the handsome stores and offices were. Then he slackened his pace and went on slowly, glancing keenly at each building until he came to one that had half a dozen brass signs on the front.
"Here's a good place to make a try," he said to himself, and going into the first office on the ground floor he asked as politely as he knew how,
"Can I shine up your brass signs for you?"
There were several young men in the outer office. One of them answered carelessly, "Yes indeed, shine 'em up, boy, and see 't you make a good job of it."
"I will that, sir," responded Theodore, blithely, and set to work with a will.
There had been much wet weather and the signs were badly discoloured. It took hard, steady rubbing for nearly an hour to get them into good shining order, but Theodore worked away vigourously until they gleamed and glittered in the morning sunlight. Then he went again into the office.
"I've finished 'em, sir," he said to the young man to whom he had spoken before, "an' I think I've made a good job of it. Will you step out an' see what you think?"
"Not at all necessary. If you're satisfied, I am," replied the man, bending over his desk and writing rapidly.
Theodore waited in silence. The young man wrote on. Finally he glanced up and remarked in a tone of surprise,
"Oh, you here yet? Thought you'd finished your job."
"I have done my part. I'm waitin' for you to do yours," replied the boy.
"Mine? What's my part, I'd like to know?" demanded the young man, sharply.
"To pay me for my work." replied Theo, promptly, but with a shadow falling on his face.
"Pay you? Well, if this isn't cheeky! I didn't agree to pay you anything."
"But you knew that I expected to be paid for my work," persisted the boy, the angry colour rising in his cheeks.
"You expected--pshaw! Young man, you've had a lesson that is well worth the time and labour you've expended," remarked the clerk in a tone of great dignity. "Hereafter you will know better than to take anything for granted in business transactions. Good-morning," and he turned his back on the boy and began to write again.
Theodore glanced around the room to see if there was any one on his side, but two of the other clerks were grinning at his discomfiture, and the others pretended not to know anything about the affair. He saw now that he had been foolish to undertake the work as he had done, but he realised that it would not help his case to make a fuss about it. All the same he was unwilling to submit without a protest.
"Next time I'll take care to make my bargain with a gentleman," he said, quietly.
He saw a singular change in the expression of the clerk's face at these words, and as he turned sharply about to leave the office he almost ran into a tall, grey-haired man who had just entered.
"Stop a bit, my boy. I don't understand that remark of yours. What bargain are you going to make with a gentleman?"
The tone of authority, together with the disturbed face of one clerk and the quite evident amusement of the others, suddenly enlightened Theodore. He knew instinctively that this man was master here and in a few quick sentences he told what had happened.
The gentleman listened in silence, but his keen, dark eyes took note of the flushed face of one clerk and the amused smiles of his companions.
"Is this boy's story true, Mr. Hammond?" he asked, sternly.
Mr. Hammond could not deny it "It was only a joke, sir," he said, uneasily.
"A joke, was it?" responded his employer. "I am not fond of such jokes." Then he turned again to the boy and inquired, "How much is due you for cleaning the signs?"
"I don't know. I'm just starting in in this business, an' I'm not sure what I ought to charge. Can you tell me, sir?"
The gentleman smiled down into the young face lifted so frankly to his.
"Why, no," he answered, gravely, but with a twinkle in his eyes. "I believe our janitor usually attends to the signs."
"Guess he don't attend to 'em very well, for they were awful dirty," remarked the boy. "Took 'me 'most an hour to shine 'em up. Did you notice 'em, sir, as you came in?"
"No, I did not. I'll look at them now," and Theodore followed the gentleman out to the steps.
"Well, you have made a good job of it, certainly," the gentleman said. "The signs haven't shone like that since they were first put there. Quite a contrast to the others on the building. Come back into the office a moment."
He went back to Mr. Hammond's desk and again Theodore followed.
"Mr. Hammond," said the gentleman, quietly, "you are willing of course to pay for your joke. The boy has done his work extremely well. I think he ought to have half a dollar for it."
With anything but a happy expression, Mr. Hammond drew from his pocket a half dollar and handed it to Theodore, who said, not to the clerk, but to the gentleman, "Thank you, sir," and left the office.
But he did not leave the building. He went to the owner of every brass sign in or on the building and asked to be allowed to make every other sign look as well as those of T.S. Harris, which he had just polished.
Now, T.S. Harris was the owner of the building and the occupants of the other offices considered that it would be wise to follow his example in this matter, so the result was that Theodore spent all the morning over the signs on that one building, and Mr. Harris having set the price, he received twenty-five cents for each sign. He was just putting a finishing rub on the last one when the janitor discovered what had been going on. He came at the boy in a great rage for he wanted no one to have anything to do with the care of the building except those whom he chose to hire.
"You take your traps an' clear out o' this now, an' don't you ever dare to show your face here again," he shouted, angrily. "If I catch ye here again I'll kick ye down the stairs!"
"P'raps Mr. Harris will have a word to say about that," replied Theodore, coolly, for in one and another of the offices he had picked up enough to convince him that the word of Mr. Harris was law in that building. Then he added, in a much more friendly tone,
"Now, look here, mister. You're too busy a man to be cleaning signs--'course you are. You've got to hire somebody t' do it an' the' won't anybody do it better or fer less money 'n I will. I'm a-goin' to make a reg'lar business of cleanin' brasses all 'round this neighbourhood, an' if you'll stan' by me an' help me fix it all right with the other bosses 'bout here--I'll see 't you don't lose anythin' by it."
The janitor's fierce frown had slowly faded as the boy spoke. Nothing pleased him so much as to be considered a person of influence, and had Theodore been ever so shrewd he could have adopted no other line of argument that would so quickly and effectually have changed an enemy into a friend as did this that he hit upon merely by chance. The man stepped down to the sidewalk and looked up at the signs with a critical air.
"Wai'," he answered, slowly, "I ain't a-goin' to deny that you've done your work well--yes a sight better'n any of the lazy rascals I've been hiring, an' if you could be depended on now, I d'know but what I might's well give the work to you as to anybody else. Of course, as you say, 'tain't my place to do servant's work like brass cleanin'."
"Of course not," assented Theo, promptly.
"But then," the man went on, "if I should speak for ye t' the janitors of the other buildings 'long here, 'n' get ye a big line o' custom, 'course I sh'ld have a right t' expect a--er--a sort o' commission on the profits, so to speak?"
"Oh!" replied Theodore, rather blankly. "Whatisa commission, anyhow?"
The man explained.
"And how much of a commission would you expect?" questioned the boy.
The janitor made a mental calculation. Here on this one building, the boy had cleaned seven signs. That made a dollar and seventy-five cents that he had earned in one morning. Of course he would not often get so much out of one building, but the man saw that there were good possibilities in this line of work.
"S'pose we say ten per cent.--ten cents out of every dollar?" he ventured, with a keen glance at the boy.
"You mean ten per cent, on all the work that I get through you?" Theo replied.
"Oh no--onallthe work of this sort that you do. That's no more'n fair since you'll owe your start to me."
"Not much! I owe my start to myself, an' I'll make no such bargain as that," answered Theo, decidedly. "I'm willin' to give you ten per cent. on all that I get through you, but not a cent more. You see I'm bound to put this thing through whether you help me or not," he added, quietly.
The janitor saw that he had been too grasping and hastened to modify his demands lest he lose his commissions altogether.
"Well, well," he said, soothingly, "we won't quarrel over a little difference like that. Let it be as you say, ten per cent. on all the jobs I get for ye, an' there's the janitor of the Laramie Building on the steps this minute. Come along with me an' I'll give ye a start over there--or, first--ain't there a little matter to attend to," he added, with an insinuating smile. "You'll settle your bills fast as they come due, of course, an' you've got a snug little sum out of my building here."
"Yes, but no thanks to you for that," replied Theo, but as the man's face darkened again, he added, "but never mind, I'll give you the commission on this work since it's in your building," and he handed eighteen cents to the janitor, who slipped it into his pocket with an abstracted air as if unconscious of what he was doing.
The result of the man's recommendation to his brother janitor was that Theodore secured the promise of all the brass cleaning in the Laramie Building also, and that with one or two small jobs kept him busy until dark when he went home with a light heart and with the sum of three dollars and fourteen cents in his pocket. To be sure he had worked hard all day to earn it, but Theodore never had been lazy and he was willing enough to work hard now.
He carried home some oranges as a special treat that night, for now he took his supper regularly with Nan who was glad to make a return in this fashion for the help he was continually giving her in carrying out her food supplies, as well as many other ways.
As they arose from the supper-table, Theodore said, "I'll go across an' see how Jimmy got on to-day, at the stand," but even as he spoke there came a low knock at the door and there stood Jimmy--no longer proud and happy as he had been in the morning, but with red eyes and a face full of trouble.
"Why, Jimmy, what's the matter?" cried Nan and Theo, in one voice.
"Come in," added Nan, kindly pulling him in and gently pushing him toward a chair.
Jimmy dropped into it with an appealing glance at Theo.
"I'm--I'm awful sorry, Tode," he began. "But I--I couldn't help it, truly I couldn't." He rubbed his sleeve hastily across his eyes as he spoke.
"But what is it, Jimmy? I'm sure you did the best you could whatever is wrong, but do tell us what it is," exclaimed Theodore, half laughing and half impatient at the uncertainty.
"'Twas that mean ol' Carrots," began Jimmy, indignantly. "I was sellin' things off in fine style, Tode, an' Carrots, he came along an' he said he wanted three san'wiches in a paper. I put 'em up fer him, an' then he asked fer six doughnuts an' some gingerbread, an' a cup o' coffee--an' he wanted 'em all in a paper."
"Not the coffee, Jimmy," said Nan, laughingly, as the boy stopped to take breath.
"No, 'course not the coffee. He swallered that an' put in a extry spoonful o' sugar too, but he wanted all the rest o' the things in a paper bag, an' I did 'em up good for him, an' then he asked me to tie a string 'round 'em, an' I got down under the stand for a piece of string, an' when I found it, an' looked up--don't you think Tode--that rascal was streakin' it down the street as fast's he could go, an' I couldn't leave the stand to run after him, an' 'course the' wasn't any p'lice 'round, an' so I had to let him go. I'm awful sorry, Theo, but I couldn't help it."
"'Course you couldn't, Jimmy. And is that all the trouble?"
"Yes, that's 'nough, ain't it?" answered Jimmy, mournfully. "He got off with more'n forty cents worth o' stuff--the old pig! I'll fix him yet!"
"Well, don't worry any more over it, Jimmy. Losin' th' forty cents won't break me, I guess," said Theo, kindly.
Jimmy brightened up a little, but the shadow again darkened his face as he said, anxiously, "I s'pose you won't never trust me to run the stand again?"
"Trust you, Jimmy? Well, I guess I will. No danger ofyourtrusting Carrots again, I'm sure."
"Not if I know myself," responded Jimmy, promptly, and Theo went on,
"I s'pose your mother wouldn't want you to stay out of school mornin's for a week or two?"
Jimmy looked at him with sparkling eyes.
"Do you mean"--he began, breathlessly, and then paused.
"I mean that I may want you to run the stand for me all next week, as well as to-morrow," Theo answered.
"Oh--ee! That's most too good to b'lieve," cried the little fellow. "Say! I think you're--you're prime, Tode. I must go an' tell ma," and he dashed out of the door, his face fairly beaming with delight.
"It's worth while to make anybody so happy, isn't it, Theo?" Nan said, then she added, thoughtfully, "Do you think the brass-cleaning will take all your time, so you can't be at the stand any more?"
"Just at first it will. Maybe I shall fix it differently after a while," he answered.
On his way to the business district the next morning, he stopped and bought a blank book and a pencil, and wherever he cleaned a sign or a railing that day, he tried to make a regular engagement to keep the brasses in good condition. If he secured a promise of the work by the month he made a reduction on his price, and every business man--or janitor who regularly engaged him, was asked to write his own name in the new blank book. Not on the first page of the book, however. That the boy kept blank until about the time when Mr. Harris had come to his office the day before. At that hour, Theodore was waiting near the office door, and there Mr. Harris found him as he came up the steps.
"Good-morning, sir," said Theo, pulling off his cap with a smile lighting up his plain face.
"Good-morning," returned the gentleman. "Have you found something else to polish up here to-day?"
"No, sir, but I wanted to ask you if you would sign your name here in my book," the boy replied.
Mr. Harris looked amused. "Come into my office," he said, "and tell me what it is that you want."
Theodore followed him across the outer office to the private room beyond. The clerks cast curious glances after the two, and Hammond scowled as he bent over his desk.
"Now let me see your book," said Mr. Harris, as the door of the office swung silently behind them.
Theo laid his rags and paste box on the carpet, and then put the blank book on the desk as he said, earnestly,
"You see, sir, I'm trying to work up a reg'lar business, an' so I want the business men I work for to engage me by the month to take care of their brass work--an' I guess I did learn a lesson here yesterday, for to-day I've asked every gentleman who has engaged me to sign his name in this book--See?"
He turned over the leaves and showed three names on the second page.
"And you want my name there, too? But I haven't engaged you. I only gave you a job yesterday."
"But your janitor has engaged me," answered Theodore, quickly.
"Well, then, isn't it the janitor's name that you want?"
"Oh, no, sir," cried the boy, earnestly. "Nobody knows the janitor, but I guess lots o' folks know you, an' your name would make others sign--don't you see?"
Mr. Harris laughed. "I see that you seem to have a shrewd business head. You'll make a man one of these days if you keep on. And you want my name on this first page?" he added, dipping his pen into the inkstand.
"Yes, because you was my first friend in this business," replied Theodore.
Mr. Harris glanced at him with that amused twinkle in his eye, but he signed his name on the first page.
Then he said, "I wish you success in your undertaking, and here's a trifle for a send-off." He held out a silver dollar as he spoke, but Theodore did not take it.
"Thank ye, sir," he said, gratefully; "you've been real good to me, but I can't take any money now, 'cept what I earn. I c'n earn all I need."
"So?" replied Mr. Harris, "you're independent. Well, I like that, but I'll keep this dollar for you, and if you ever get in a tight place you can come to me for it."
"Thank you, Mr. Harris," said the boy again. "I won't forget, but I hope I won't need it," and then he picked up his belongings and left the office. As he passed Mr. Hammond's desk, he said, "Good-morning, sir," but the clerk pretended not to hear.
All through the next week and for weeks after, Theodore spent his time from nine to five o'clock, cleaning brasses and making contracts for the regular care of them, until he had secured as much work as he could attend to himself.
Meantime, Jimmy Hunt had taken entire charge of the stand and was doing well with it. Theo gave him four-fifths of the profits and he was perfectly satisfied, and so was his mother, who found his earnings a welcome addition to the slim family income, and it was so near the end of the school term that she concluded it did not matter if Jimmy did stay out the few remaining weeks.
But busy as Theodore was, he still found time to carry out what Nan cooked for the people in the two houses, as well as to drop in on one and another of his many neighbours every evening--for by this time the night school had closed for the season. His Saturday evenings were still spent at the flower stand, and now that blossoms were more plentiful, he received more and better ones in payment for his work, and his Sunday morning visits to the different rooms were looked forward to all the week by many of those to whom he went, and hardly less so by himself, for the boy was learning by glad experience the wonderful joy that comes from giving happiness to others. When he saw how the flowers he carried to stuffy, dirty, crowded rooms, were kept and cherished and cared for even until they were withered and dead--he was sure that his little flower mission was a real blessing.
Before the hot weather came, Tommy O'Brien was carried away out of the noisy, crowded room to the Hospital for Incurables. Theo had brought one of the dispensary doctors to see the boy, and through the doctor's efforts and those of Mr. Scott, Tommy had been received into the hospital. He had never been so comfortable in his brief life as he was there, but at first he was lonely, and so Theodore went once or twice a week to see him, and he never failed to save out some flowers to carry to Tommy on Sunday.
But, however full Theodore's time might be, and however busy his hands, he never forgot the search for Jack Finney. His eyes were always watching for a blue-eyed, sandy-haired boy of sixteen, and he made inquiries for him everywhere. Three times he heard of a boy named Finney, and sought him out only to be disappointed, for the first Jack Finney he found was a little chap of ten or eleven, and the next was a boy of sixteen, but with hair and eyes as black as a Jew's--and besides, it turned out that his name wasn't Finney at all, but Findlay; and the third time, the boy he found was living at home with his parents, so Theo knew that no one of the three was the boy of whom he was in search and although he did not in the least give up the matter, he came to the conclusion at last that his Jack Finney must have left the city.
Mr. Scott interested himself in the search because of his great interest in Theodore, and he went to the reform school and the prison, but the name he sought was on neither record.
Although Theodore said nothing to any one about it, he was also on the lookout for another boy, and that boy was Carrots. Ever since Carrots had stolen the food from the stand, Theo had wanted to find him. More than once he had caught a glimpse in the streets of the lank figure and the frowzy red head, but Carrots had no desire to meet Theo and he took good care to keep out of his way.