Miss Barnet sprang lightly to the sidewalk, and beside her Mr. Jerome Beck flecked the dust of travel from the bay of his waistcoat, shaking his trousers knees into place.
"This has got your Twenty-third Street dump beat a mile, and then some, 'ain't it, Peachy?"
"Jerry, call her here, the little girl. You tell her who—who I am. Tell her gently, Jerry, and—and how good I'm going to be to her and—Aw, ain't I the silly, though, to feel so trembly?"
The child on the step regarded their approach with unsmiling eyes, nor did she move except to draw aside her dark stuff skirts and close her knees until they touched.
"Hello there! Moping again, eh? Get up! Didn't I tell you not to let me catch you not out playing or helping Cloonan around? Say howdy to this lady. She's coming out here to live. Come here and say howdy to her."
The child shrank to the newel-post, her narrow little face overtaken with an agony of shyness.
"Cat got your tongue? Say howdy. Quit breathing through your mouth like a fish. Say howdy, that's a good girl."
"Don't force her, Jerry. She's bashful. Ain't you, dearie? Ain't you,
Maisie?"
"Moping, you mean. If it was her month in the dirty Harlem flat she'd be spry enough. She knows what I mean whan I say that, and she knows she better cut out this pouting. Quit breathing through your mouth or I'll stick a cork in it."
"Aw, Jerry, she can't help that!"