then Eleanore asked me placidly,

"Do you like my pretty new shoes?"

"What's that got to do with it?" I demanded indignantly.

"Nothing, I guess," she said meekly.

This girl was full of mysteries. One great point in her favor was that
she had a mother "at death's door." This appealed to me tremendously.
It was so unusual.

"How's your mother?" I would ask her often, just for the pleasure of
hearing her answer softly,

"She's at death's door, thank you."

She soon learned to skate much better, and I remember quite vividly
still the January afternoon when as the darkness deepened a silvery moon
appeared overhead. I had not skated with her for a week, but now we'd
been skating for nearly an hour. One by one the others went home, and
the plump girl turned at the kitchen door to call back to Eleanore
tauntingly,

"You'll catch it, going home so late!"

"Never mind," said a gentle voice at my side, and round and round we
skated. The moon grew steadily brighter. Still that soft steady clutch
on my arm.

"Now you'd better go home," I said gruffly at last.

"What time is it?" she asked me. I looked at my watch.

"Gee! It's nearly seven o'clock!"

"What a pretty watch that is," she said in a pleased, quiet voice, but I
was not to be diverted.

"Go on home, I tell you. Sit down and I'll take off your skates." She
sighed regretfully but obeyed.

"What'll they do to you?" I asked her when we stopped in front of her
house.

"They'll try to punish me," she answered. I looked down at her
anxiously.

"Hard?" I inquired. She smiled at me.

"What time is it now?" she asked.

"Ten minutes after seven."

"Then they won't punish me," she said. "My father always comes home at
seven." And she went placidly into the house.

"A mighty smart Chip," I said to myself.

I had told her a little about the docks, and one day she asked me to
take her there. I promptly refused, but patiently from time to time she
repeated her request. She wanted me to take her "just for a little
walk" down there, or she would run if I preferred. She wanted to come
out after supper into her garden, which was only the third from ours,
and then she would sing and I would whistle. Then I would come around by
the street and she would meet me at her front gate. I don't know how she
ever persuaded me, but she did, and the plan worked splendidly. At the
gate without a word I took her hand and ran down the street. Soon we
were flying. Down to the