ered the windows of the room they were in, which seemed now used as a salon. The furniture was of the second-hand sort and had been maltreated. The yellowed keys of the small piano were charred by cigarette stubs.
The negro girl went away, teetering on her high heels, and could be heard knocking at one of the inner doors. Then a middle-aged trained nurse appeared. She too looked curiously at Peewee.
"This is the boy?" she asked.
"This is him," the man replied.
The nurse looked at Peewee. "You're the little boy that sells newspapers on Madison Street between Wells Street and La Salle?"
Peewee felt more at ease in the presence of the nurse. What it was that was happening to him, he could not divine, but it was at least nothing in the regular course of justice and charity. "Yes'm," he confirmed.
"I picked him up this evening," the man explained, "after he'd sold out his papers. He was headed this direction and I let him come and only laid hands upon him a few blocks back. The
