ly.

"You rat! Out of my way!"

The auctioneer placed his hand upon the boy's arm, with the intention
of hurling him aside. But, strange to say, although he was taller than
the youth, he could not budge the latter for several seconds, and by
that time the young lady had disappeared, swallowed up in the noonday
crowd which surged past the door.

"Now see what you have done!" stormed Caleb Gulligan wrathfully. "You
have aided that young woman to escape!"

"That's just what I meant to do," returned Matt, with a coolness that
would have been exasperating to even a less sensitive man than the
crusty auctioneer.

"I shall hold you responsible for it!"

"I don't care if you do," was Matt's dogged reply. "She's my friend,
and I always stick up for my friends."

At this last remark there was a low murmur of approval from those
gathered about. Evidently, the boy's unpolished but honest manner had
won considerable admiration.

"Do you know that I can have you locked up?"

"What for?"

"For aiding her to escape."

"Didn't she have a right to hurry away if she wanted to go? It's
almost one o'clock--I'll have to be off myself soon, if I want to keep
my job."

There was a laugh at this, and half a dozen looked at their watches
and left.

"If you please," put in the assistant nervously. "Had we not better go
on with the sales? The crowd will be gone before long. We might make
more than what was lost here."

"Certainly, go on with the sales," howled Caleb Gulligan. "I will take
care of this young rascal, and find out what has become of that young
woman."

"And that man," began the assistant.

"Never mind the man; the young woman shall pay for the damage done,
and she can fix it up with the man afterward, if she wishes. I am not
going to stand the loss."

"It seems to me you are making an awful row over a fifteen-cent piece
of plaster-of-paris," said Matt to Gulligan, as Andrew Dilks turned
toward the auctioneer's stand. "Why didn't you ask me to pay for the
stuff and done?"

"Plaster-of-paris!" cried the auctioneer wrathfully. "That is real
Italian marble----"

"Made in Centre street," interrupted Matt.

"And it is worth every cent of ten dollars----"

"Ten dollars a carload, you mean," went on the boy. "Come, let go of
me; I've got to go to work."

"You'll go to the Tombs!"

"No, I won't. I have done nothing wrong, and I want you to let go of
me."

Matt began to struggle, much to the delight of the s