was a young girl in a gingham dress and without other
covering, who stood timidly at the counter and asked for three dollars
on a watch, a keepsake evidently, which she was loath to part with.
Perhaps it was the last glimpse of brighter days. The pawnbroker was
doubtful; it was not worth so much. She pleaded hard, while he
compared the number of the movement with a list sent in from Police
Headquarters.

"Two," he said decisively at last, snapping the case shut--"two or
nothing." The girl handed over the watch with a troubled sigh. He made
out a ticket and gave it to her with a handful of silver change.

Was it the sigh and her evident distress, or was it the little dollar?
As she turned to go, he called her back.

"Here, it is Christmas!" he said. "I'll run the risk." And he added
the coupon to the little heap.

The girl looked at it and at him questioningly.

"It is all right," he said; "you can take it; I'm running short of
change. Bring it back if they won't take it. I'm good for it." Uncle
Sam had achieved a backer.

In Grand Street the holiday crowds jammed every store in their eager
hunt for bargains. In one of them, at the knit-goods counter, stood
the girl from the pawnshop, picking out a thick, warm shawl. She
hesitated between a gray and a maroon-colored one, and held them up to
the light.

"For you?" asked the salesgirl, thinking to aid her. She glanced at
her thin dress and shivering form as she said it.

"No," said the girl; "for mother; she is poorly and needs it." She
chose the gray, and gave the salesgirl her handful of money.

The girl gave back the coupon.

"They don't go," she said; "give me another, please."

"But I haven't got another," said the girl, looking apprehensively at
the shawl. "The--Mr. Feeney said it was all right. Take it to the
desk, please, and ask."

The salesgirl took the bill and the shawl, and went to the desk. She
came back, almost immediately, with the storekeeper, who looked
sharply at the customer and noted the number of the coupon.

"It is all right," he said, satisfied apparently by the inspection; "a
little unusual, only. We don't see many of them. Can I help you,
miss?" And he attended her to the door.

In the street there was even more of a Christmas show going on than in
the stores. Pedlers of toys, of mottoes, of candles, and of
knickknacks of every description stood in rows along the curb, and
were driving a lively trade. Their push-carts were decora