ask you to speak to me if I was any ways fit," he said, holding out a not over-cleanly hand.
The little maid must have judged the boy by his face rather than his apparel, for hardly had he spoken when she came boldly towards him and laid her tiny hand on his cheek with a caressing movement that captivated Joe immediately.
"Talk about daisies! Why, you're a corker! You look jest like a pink an' blue image I've seen in the shop windows. What's your name?"
"Essie," the little lady replied, and added what may have been words; but might equally well be Greek so far as Joe was concerned.
"What's that you say? I didn't jest catch on."
Miss Essie cooed at him once more, and Joe winked and blinked, trying most earnestly to understand what she said; but all to no purpose.
Then he stood erect, fearing lest the little maid's parents should appear and reprove him for having dared to speak to her; but the moments passed and no one came to claim the child.
It was evident Essie had not been accustomed to neglect, for when Joe ceased speaking, she put a tiny little hand in his and told him in her childish dialect what may have been a very interesting story.
Joe looked at the pink hand, and then at his own soiled palm.
"I'd give a nickel if I was a little bit cleaner! It seems like it was wicked to hold her hand while mine is so dirty. She takes the shine off of anything I ever saw before. Say, Essie, where's your mamma?"
"Mamma dorn," and the little lady clutched Joe's finger yet more tightly.
"Well, say, do you s'pose this kid's lost?" and now Joe began to look alarmed. "Anybody what would lose their grip of a dandy little thing like her ought to be horsewhipped, an' I'd like to do it."
Again he tried to get some information from the little maid, and again she replied readily; but Joe was no wiser than before.
The night had come; those who passed this way or that on the sidewalk moved rapidly as if in haste to get home; but no one gave any heed to the ruined fruit merchant or the charming little child by his side.
"Look here, baby," Joe said, after what seemed to him like a long time of waiting, and no one came to claim the child, "will you let me take you up in my arms, if I try not to muss your clothes? I'm 'fraid folks can't see sich a bit of a thing down there, an' I'll hold you high, so's your mother can find you easier."
Miss Essie certainly understood something of what the fruit merchant said, for she held out her hands towards him as if to be taken, and he lifted her carefully, saying, as he did so:
"It's pretty rough for a feller like me to handle a kid like her! It seems like I was holdin' some of that swell candy you see in the shop windows. It'll be a wonder if I don't daub her all up with my great, dirty hands. I never knew how big they was till she took hold of 'em."
The little maid must have thought he was speaking for her especial benefit, for she made reply in language which apparently gave her the most intense satisfaction, but failed to enlighten Master Potter, and during perhaps five minutes the two stood on the sidewalk near the curbstone, jostled rudely now and then by the homeward-bound throng, but seeing no one who laid claim to the baby.
"This won't do at all," Joe said. "It ain't right for you to stay out in the night, and I don't know what's to be done, unless you could stand it for a spell in Plums's shanty. Say, I wonder if that wouldn't go down? Will you be willin' to hang 'round with us till mornin', if I buy a slat of good things? When it comes daylight I can find your folks without much trouble, 'cause of course they'll be right here huntin', don't you see? Is it a go?"
From what the little maid said, Joe concluded it was a "go," and, since she made no protest when he walked swiftly down towards where he knew his fat and hungry friend would be waiting for him, believed he had chosen such a course as met with her approval.
CHAPTER II.
THE PRINCESS
It was no easy task for Joe Potter to carry his burden, light though it was, amid the throng of pedestrians, without being pushed rudely here or there by those who were so intent upon their own business or pleasure as to give but little heed to the boy and the child.
Had he been alone, he could readily have forced a passage, but fearing lest the little maid might be injured by rough contact with one or the other, he proceeded so cautiously as to make but slight headway, until, forsaking the sidewalk, he betook himself to the street.
There was a fear in his mind lest Master Plummer, grown weary with long waiting, had gone home, and this would have been a serious matter, because Joe had no idea as to the whereabouts of his friend's lodgings.
Once out of the throng, he pressed on at a swift pace until he was nearly overturned by a boy coming from the opposite direction, whom he had failed to see in the shadows.
"What's the matter with you, chump? Can't you see where you're goin'?" he cried, angrily, and the tightening of the little maid's arm around his neck told that she was frightened.
"How much of this street do you own? Why don't you mind your – Hello, Joe Potter, is that you?" and the ruined merchant recognised the voice as that of his friend with whom he had spoken a short time before in front of the fruit store.
"'Course it's me. You ought'er look out how you run 'round here, when folks has got babies in their arms."
"I didn't see you, Joe, an' that's a fact. Where'd you get the kid?"
"She's lost, I reckon, an' I'm takin' her home for to-night," Joe replied, and, without waiting to make further explanation, hastened on, leaving his friend, the clerk, staring after him in open-mouthed astonishment.
"Don't you be afraid, little one," Joe said, as Essie clung yet more tightly to him. "They sha'n't hurt you, an' if there's any more funny business of runnin' into us tried, I'll break the feller's jaw what does it."
The child seemed reassured by the sound of his voice, and at once began to tell him something which was evidently interesting to herself.
"If I could understand what you say, things would be all right," Joe said, with a laugh, and then, as he emerged from the shadows cast by the overhead railway structure, he came face to face with Master Plummer.
"Well, I'd begun to think you never was comin'," that young gentleman began, but ceased speaking very suddenly, as he observed the burden in Joe's arms. "What you got there?"
"Can't you see for yourself?" and Joe lowered the little maid gently to the sidewalk, that Master Plummer might have a full view of his treasure.
"Well, I'll be blowed! Where'd you get it?"
"She's lost, 'cordin' to my way of thinkin', an' I've been tryin' to find her folks, but it's no use huntin' 'round in the night, an' I'll tell you what it is, Plums, we've got to take care of her till mornin'."
"Take care of her! What's creepin' on you, Joe Potter? How do you think we're goin' to look after a kid like that?"
"I don't know why we can't," Joe replied, sharply. "It'll be pretty tough if a couple of fellers ain't able to tend out on a mite of a thing such as her. Say, Plums, don't she look like somethin' you see in the store windows?"
"She's fine as silk, there's no gettin' over that," and Master Plummer would have touched one pink-and-white cheek but that his friend prevented him.
"Now don't go to hurtin' her! She's in hard luck enough as it is, without your mussin' her all up."
"Who's a-hurtin' of her? I was jest goin' to put one finger on her cheek."
"There's no need of doin' so much as that. It might frighten the little thing, and besides, she's too fine to be handled by you and me, Plums. She's a reg'lar little princess, that's what she is," and Joe raised the child quickly, as if to remove the temptation from Master Plummer's path.
"What's her name?" the fat boy asked, as he gazed admiringly at the child.
"I can't seem to make out, she talks so queer," and as if to illustrate his meaning, Joe's princess began to chatter, while she clasped both