pt him from going was the fact that he had no
clothes. By the end of his first year in the flat, the little suit he
had been wearing when he came was in utter rags. Big Tom had bought him
no new suit, declaring that he could not afford it. So Johnnie had had
to decide between putting on some of Cis's old garments or Barber's
mammoth cast-offs. He chose the latter, which Mrs. Kukor offered to
alter, but Barber refused her help. And she knew at once what Johnnie
did not guess: the longshoreman wanted the boy to appear ridiculous.

The plan worked. The first time Johnnie had ventured into the area
wearing his baggy breeches and a voluminous shirt, the boys who had from
the first called "Girl's hair!" at him changed their taunt to "Old
clothes!" It had sent him scurrying back into the flat, and it had kept
him there, so that Big Tom had some one to look after Grandpa steadily,
and bring in a small wage besides.

But now not even the likelihood of being mocked for his ragged misfits
could keep Johnnie back. Darting into the hall, he crouched in the dark
passage a moment to listen, his heart pounding so hard that he could
hear it; then certain that the way was yet clear, he straddled the
banisters and, with his two strong hands to steady him and act as a
brake to his speed, took the three flights to the ground floor.

As Big Tom usually entered the area by the tunnel-like hall that led in
from the main street to the south, Johnnie headed north, first taking
care to glance out into the area before he charged across it, blinded by
its glare after the semidark of the Barber rooms. He was hatless. His
hair and his fringe flew. His feet flew, too, as if the longshoreman
were at their horny little heels.

The north tunnel gained, he scampered along it. As he dodged out of it,
and westward, again the glare of the outdoors blinded him, so that he
did not see a crowd that was ahead of him--a crowd made up wholly of
boys.

He plunged among the lot. Instantly a joyous wrangle of cries went up:
"Girl's hair! Girl's hair! Old clothes! Old clothes!" A water-pistol
discharged a chill stream into his face. Hands seized him, tearing at
his rags.

Savagely he battled at the center of the mob, hitting, kicking, biting.
His sight cleared, and he made the blows of his big hands tell. "Leave
me alone!" he screamed. "Leave me alone!"

The crowd doubled as men and women rushed up to see what the excitement
was all about. Then hands laid hold