man, if you're that. This doll costs _twenty_
dollars."

"I know, and I don't pretend to have saved up a million. But this
mix-up is my fault, and the man was my customer, so I ought to stand
the racket. Look here," and he proudly drew forth from some inner
pocket on his enormous chest a handsome gold watch destitute of a
chain. "Presentation," he announced. "You can see my name _and_ the
date. I've hocked this more'n once and got forty. Will you keep it
till my customer turns up?"

"No," returned Tobias magnanimously. "If you're so sure of your man, I
guess it's all right, and the sale'll have to stand. I'm sorry, Mr.
Logan. But you see how it is. Can't one of our young ladies show you
something else?"

"No, thank you, not to-day," said Logan, his long, sallow face red and
the twinkle gone out of his eyes. "It was Little Sister or nothing for
me."

But though he gathered up his mass of greenbacks and stalked away with
his smart hat on the back of his incredibly sleek head, Tobias was not
greatly worried. The young swell was sweet on Child, and wasn't above
a flirtation with red-haired Leavitt at the same time he was trying to
spoon the English girl. He would come back, and soon--no fear!--to see
how his invention was going.

"Lordy! but that was a big bluff I put up!" sighed Earl Usher to
Cupid, as he slid his watch into the little boy's hand. "If Tobias had
taken me, I'd 'a' bin up a tree! Sure you can get off, sonny?"

"Dead sure, for they'll be sendin' me out. They always do. I'll manage
the biz for you."

"Good Bud! You get a quarter for yourself, see?--for puttin' me on to
the job in time."

Mr. Tobias happened to be at a distance when Usher's customer
came in and paid. But when the floorwalker inquired, at
six-thirty--characteristically remembering a small detail in the
terrible Christmas rush--the transaction had been completed and Little
Sister was gone. Even Win had not seen the purchaser. Ursus had come
in a hurry, his client's twenty dollars in hand, and had taken away
the box that contained the doll. There had not even been time to ask
if the man who had bought it looked kind and rich; but Win was too
thankful to have been saved from her "scrape" with Logan to care
passionately, after all, for Little Sister's fate.

That night, a few minutes before ten o'clock, the employees of the
various sections were lined up (men in one aisle, girls in another) to
receive their pay envelopes and, in most c