rtant engagement he had made with Mr.
Astor, and, being careful first to find the right numbers in the book,
got in touch with numerous large concerns, and ordered jewelry,
bicycles, limousines, steam boilers and paper drinking cups with
magnificent lavishness.

He had finished ordering his tenth automobile, which was to be done up
in red velvet to match the faithful Buckle, when there fell upon his
quick ear the sound of a step. In the next instant he let go of the
clothesline, sent the telephone book slipping from the chair at his
feet, and plunged like a swimmer toward that loose ball of gingham under
the sink.

And not a moment too soon; for scarcely had he tossed the tied strings
over his tea-leaf-sprinkled hair, when the door opened, and there, coat
on arm, great chest heaving from his climb, bulgy eyes darting to mark
the condition of the flat, stood--Barber!

CHAPTER V

NEW FRIENDS

IT WAS an awful moment.

During that moment there was dead silence. Johnnie's heart stopped
beating, his ears sang, his throat knotted as if paralyzed, and the skin
on the back of his head crinkled; while in all those uneven thickets of
his tawny, tea-stained hair, small, dreadful winds stirred, and he
seemed to lift--horribly--away from the floor.

Also, a sickish, sinking feeling at the lower end of his breastbone made
him certain that he was about to break in two; and a sudden wobbling of
the knees threatened to bring him down upon them.

Barber closed the hall door at his back--gently, so as not to waken his
father. His eyes were still roving the kitchen appraisingly. It was
plain that the full sink and the littered table were having their effect
upon him; for he had begun that chewing on nothing which betokened a
rising temper.

Johnnie saw, but he was too stunned and scared to think of any way out
of his difficulty. He might have caught up the big cooking spoon and
rapped on that lead pipe--five times in rapid succession, as if he were
trying to clear the spoon of the cereal clinging to its bowl. The five
raps was a signal that he had not used for a long time. It belonged to
that dreadful era to which Cis and he referred as "before the saloons
shut up." Preceding the miracle that had brought the closing of these,
Barber, returning home from his day's work, had needed no excuse for
using the strap or his boot upon either of the children. And once he had
struck helpless old Grandpa--a happening remembered by C