say, ten or more pounds. They are giving large sums
for these things in London. Perhaps you have not
made a specialty of china."

Otto had now forgotten the tureen and was scrutinizing
the speaker, wondering what kind of a man
he really was--this fellow who looked and spoke like
a person of position, knew the value of curios at sight,
and yet who had confessed the night before to being
behind with his rent and anxious to sell his belongings
to keep off the street. Then the doubt, universal in
the minds of second-hand dealers, arose. "Come along
vid me and tell me some more. Vot is dot chair?"
and he drew out a freshly varnished relic of better
days.

The man seized the chair by the back, canted it to
see all sides of it, and was about to give his decision
when the laughter of a child and the sharp, quick bark
of a dog caused him to pause and raise his head. A
white fox-terrier with a clothes-pin tail, two scissored
ears, and two restless, shoe-button eyes, peering through
button-hole lids, followed by a little girl ten or twelve
years of age, was regarding him suspiciously.

"He won't hurt you," cried the child. "Come back,
you naughty Fudge!"

"I do not intend he shall," said the man, reaching
down and picking the dog up bodily by the scruff of