ash cans and barrels as she could,
in hopes of finding something this time which would please Mrs. Brown,
so that she could dare to show her doll, and perhaps be allowed to sit
up and play with it a little.

Mrs. Brown was the cross old woman who kept the cellar, and the children
on the street called her "Grumpy."

Biddy did not find anything in particular, and got fewer pennies than
usual for errands and for showing people the way to places, so that old
Mrs. Brown was very cross indeed, and Biddy went to bed without daring
to pull Dolly out where she could see her. She lay awake, with her hand
on it, waiting for Charley.

Charley was a newsboy, but he was not a lucky little boy. He had the
large and beautiful deep blue eyes you may often see in the children of
Irish immigrants. But he was weak in body, and very shy. He lived as
Biddy did, among rough people, who were all the more rough because they
were so poor and miserable. So he got knocked about a great deal, and
stood no chance at all among other newsboys, who shoved him aside, and
called their papers so loud that Charley's thin voice could not be
heard. Some newsboys make money selling papers--make so much that they
can start in other kinds of business for themselves, and get on very
well in the world among other successful men. I have seen this kind of
newsboy. They have bright, sharp, old-looking faces. They have wiry,
strong bodies, good health, and seem to be afraid of nothing.

Charley wasn't this sort of boy at all. He got poked, and pushed, and
cuffed, and tripped up, and laughed at. The girls called him
"fraid-cat," because they thought he was a coward. The boys said he was
just like a girl, and shouted, "Hallo, Polly!" when they saw him.
Charley did not say much to all this. He went with his papers every day,
and managed to sell a few; and, besides, he did errands quickly and
well. In these ways he earned enough to pay for his straw in Mrs.
Brown's cellar, and to buy enough to eat to keep life in him.

Charley's straw was next to Biddy's straw, and when he came in that
night Biddy whispered to him all about her doll, telling him especially
how one of its arms was broken off at the elbow. Charley put out his
hand in the dark, and asked her to let him take the doll a moment. He
felt it over carefully, and gave it back without saying anything. Biddy
whispered a little more, and then they went to sleep.

One day Biddy happened to come in a little after