Beside him stood a big billy-goat, harnessed to a two-wheeled cart
made of a soap-box.
As Babcock stepped aside to let the boy pass he heard Cully
shouting in answer to the little cripple's cries. "Cheese it,
Patsy. Here's Pete Lathers comin' down de yard. Look out fer
Stumpy. He'll have his dog on him."
Patsy laid down the pail and crept through the door again, drawing
the crutch after him. The yardmaster passed with a bulldog at his
heels, and touching his hat to the contractor, turned the corner
of the coal-shed.
"What is your name?" said Babcock gently. A cripple always
appealed to him, especially a child.
"My name's Patsy, sir," looking straight up into Babcock's eyes,
the goat nibbling at his thin hand.
"And who are you looking for?"
"I come down with mother's dinner, sir. She's here working on the
dock. There she is now."
"I thought ye were niver comin' wid that dinner, darlint," came a
woman's voice. "What kept ye? Stumpy was tired, was he? Well,
niver mind."
The woman lifted the little fellow in her arms, pushed back his
cap and smoothed his hair with her fingers, her whole face beaming
with tenderness.
"Gimme the crutch, darlint, and hold on to me tight, and we'll get
under the shed out of the sun till I see what Jennie's sent me.
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