off he must post;
that was imperative. Mr. Tripple offered his services when David had
started down-stairs, and when there was no chance of his turning back,
but David said, "No, no, Tripple; you just stay and keep the girls
company till I get back, and that'll be enough for you to attend to.
Good-by, girls. Good-by, Little Scout; if it wasn't so cold, she should
go too." And off he trudged, as patient, and cheerful, and proud of his
master's attention and of his mission, too, now he had fully set out, as
many a younger and better dressed man would have been.

IV.

When Emanuel Griffin, Esq., leaving the dark little street wherein stood
his warehouse and wherein very much of his life and very little of his
money was spent--which latter fact had, however, no merely local
application but was of a general nature--when, to resume, Emanuel
Griffin, Esq., buttoning up his overcoat and, leaving the dark little
street, turned the next corner among the mountainous stores and looked
vexedly around for a car to bear him to his home across the river, and
rattled his keys in his pocket, and nearly hummed a tune in his
impatience, suddenly, as the car appeared like a new planet, and with
the easy-going motions of a planet in its ascent had nearly reached
him--suddenly a thought of something forgotten flashed through his mind,
and the violence of its reaction turned him completely around and sent
him in a precipitous hurry in the opposite direction, namely, in that
which David Dubbs and his little daughter had pursued but a short time
before.

"Pshaw!" he muttered, and looked as if he would like to add something a
great deal stronger. "That's what I forgot to tell David; but Mrs. G. 'll
never forget it, nor forgive it, either, if I don't attend to it
before I get home." So he turned up his collar, and rubbed his ears, and
hurried on to keep warm.

His destination proved to be a fancy bakery in the neighborhood of David
Dubbs's house. The pavement in front of it at that hour and season,
owing to holiday orders, was sending up warm steam from the oven
beneath, and a fragrant and appetizing smell of hot bread and browning
cakes pervaded the street. It was a large establishment of the kind, and
besides its legitimate line of bread-baking, took charge of the cooking
and preparing of dinners for ladies of limited domestic conveniences in
fashionable life. Heedless of the delicious scents which had attracted
several men with greedy e