ars on the windows where _poor_ little girls live. For the simple
reason that nobody wants to steal _them_."

Gwendolyn considered the statement, her fingers still busy knotting and
unknotting.

"I tell you," Jane launched forth again, "that if you run about on the
street, like poor children do, you'll be grabbed up by a band of
kidnapers."

"Are--are kidnapers worse than doctors?" asked Gwendolyn.

"Worse than doctors!" scoffed Thomas, "_Heaps_ worse."

"Worse than--than bears?" (The last trace of that rebellious red was
gone.)

Up and down went Jane's head solemnly. "Kidnapers carry knives--big
curved knives."

Now Gwendolyn recalled a certain terror-inspiring man with a long belted
coat and a cap with a shiny visor. It was not his height that made her
fear him, for her father was fully as tall; and it was not his
brass-buttoned coat, or the dark, piercing eyes under the visor. She
feared him because Jane had often threatened her with his coming; and,
secondly, because he wore, hanging from his belt, a cudgel--long and
heavy and thick. How that cudgel glistened in the sunlight as it swung
to and fro by a thong!

"Worse than a--a p'liceman?" she faltered.

"Policeman? _Yes!_"

"Than the p'liceman that's--that's always hanging around here?"

Now Jane giggled, and blushed as red as her hair. "Hush!" she chided.

Thomas poked a teasing finger at her. "Haw! Haw!" he laughed. "There's
other people that's noticed a policeman hangin' round. _He's_ a dandy,
he is!--_not_. He let that old hand organ man give him a black eye."

"Pooh!" retorted Jane. "You know how much I care about that policeman!
It's only that I like to have him handy for just such times as this."

But Gwendolyn was dwelling on the newly discovered scourge of moneyed
children. "What would the kidnapers do?" she inquired.

"The kidnapers," promptly answered Jane, "would take you and shut you up
in a nasty cellar, where there was rats and mice and things and--"

Gwendolyn's mouth began to quiver.

Hastily Jane put out a hand. "But we'll look sharp that nothin' of the
kind happens," she declared stoutly; "for who can git you when you're in
the car--_especially_ when Thomas is along to watch out. So"--with a
great show of enthusiasm--"we'll go out, oh! for a _grand_ ride." She
rose. "And maybe when we git into the country a ways, we'll invite
Thomas to take the inside seat opposite," (another wink) "and he'll tell
you about soldierin' in India