When he returned, he had a package carefully tucked under his arm.
It was a mild day and Ruth was sitting on the steps with Stray in her lap. She had pinned a small shawl around him, and was now holding him like a baby, in which position, he seemed most comfortable.
Ruth looked up as Billy came in. "I am pretending that Stray is my child. He is the only doll I have now to play with," she said.
Billy laughed a little gleeful laugh as he stopped to look at the patient Stray whose brown paws hung helplessly outside the shawl. "He ain't got quite such a pretty complexion as your other doll," said Billy. "He's as dark as a Dago. Maybe he is one."
"Oh, no, he's not," returned Ruth, looking down, a little out of conceit with her baby.
"I'd rather play a dog was a dog," said Billy.
"Oh, no, you wouldn't, not if you were a girl and hadn't any doll. What would you do then?"
"I'd get one, with a blue dress on," answered Billy, going into the house laughing.
Ruth felt that this was an unnecessarily cruel taunt, and did not follow him. Great would have been her surprise if she had seen him enter Miss Hester's presence, joyfully holding out his package and crying: "I've got it, I've got it, and I'm goin' to work Saturdays, an hour every Saturday for a month, to pay for it. Ain't that fine? I tell ye Dr. Peaslee is a brick."
Miss Hester held out eager hands. "Let me see, Billy," she said.