ung for a week or two about the vicarage, in the hope
of seeing her, but in vain. As a matter of fact, Maisie Shepherd had
left for Scotland the morning after the school treat; people don't come
to Bludston for long and happy holidays. So Paul had to feed his ardent
little soul on memories. That she had not been an impalpable creature
of his fancy was proven by the precious cornelian heart. Her words,
too, were written in fine flame across his childish mind. Paul began to
live the life of dreams.

He longed for books. The fragmentary glimpses of history and geography
in the Board school standard whetted without satisfying his
imagination. There was not a book in the house in Budge Street, and he
had never a penny to buy one. Sometimes Button would bring home a dirty
newspaper, which Paul would steal and read in secret, but its contents
seemed to lack continuity. He thirsted for a story. Once a generous
boy, since dead-he was too good to live had given him a handful of
penny dreadfuls, whence he had derived his knowledge of pirates and Red
Indians. Too careless and confident, he had left them about the
kitchen, and his indignant mother had used them to light the fire. The
burning of his library was an enduring tragedy. He realized that it
must be reconstituted; but how? His nimble wit hit on a plan. Vagrant
as an unowned dog, he could roam the streets at pleasure. Why should he
not sell newspapers-in a quarter of the town, be it understood, remote
from both factory and Budge Street? He sold newspapers for three weeks
before he was found out. Then he was chastised and forced to go on
selling newspapers with no profit to himself, for his person was
rigorously searched and coppers confiscated as soon as he came home.
But during the three weeks' traffic on his own account he had amassed a
sufficient hoard of pennies for the purchase of several books in gaudy
paper covers exposed for sale in the little stationer's shop round the
corner. Soon he discovered that if he could batik a copper or two on
his way home his mother would be none the wiser. The stationer became
his banker, and when the amount of the deposit equaled the price of a
book, Paul withdrew his money's worth. So a goodly library of amazing
rubbish was stored by degrees under the scullery slab, until it outgrew
safe accommodation; whereupon Paul transferred the bulk of it to a hole
in a bit of waste ground, a deserted brickfield on the ragged outskirts
of the town