policeman?--he doesn't like to be called that. . . . It isn't _his_
fault. He always throws stones at the bad boys when they call him that.
Call him just 'Jerry.'"

That gamin, turning from a minute examination of Redmond's spurred
moccasins, began to swing his chubby legs and bounce up and down upon the
cushioned seat.

"Her name's Alice," he volunteered, with a sidelong fling of his
carrot-tinted head. "Yes! she's my sister"--he made a snatch at the pup
whose speedy demise was threatened, from blood to the head--"don't hold
Porkey that way, Alice! his eyes'll drop out."

But his juvenile confrere shrugged away from his clutch. "Stupid!" she
retorted, with fine scorn, "no they won't . . . . it's on'y guinea pigs
that do that!--when you hold them up by their tails." Nevertheless she
promptly reversed that long-suffering canine, which immediately
demonstrated its gratitude by licking her face effusively.

The all-important question of the hobo was next commended to his
attention, with a tremendous amount of chattering rivalry, and, with
intense gravity he was cogitating how to render a satisfactory finding to
both factions when steps, and the unmistakable rustle of skirts, sounded
in his immediate rear. Then a lady's voice said, "Oh, there you are,
children! . . . I was wondering where you'd got to."

The two heads bobbed up simultaneously, with a joyful "Here's Mother!"
and George, turning, glanced with innate, well-bred curiosity at a stout,
pleasant-faced, middle-aged woman who stood beside them.