ILLUSTRATIONS
| “Tor flattened himself against a convenient wall” | [Frontispiece] |
| “ ‘I have said it. I will take thee to the King’ ” | [Facing p. 48] |
| “ ‘Take him away!’ she commanded” | [Facing p. 112] |
| “His wicked face disfigured with rage and pain” | [Facing p. 168] |
TOR, A STREET BOY OF JERUSALEM
CHAPTER I
A STRANGER COMES TO TOWN
Tor was hungry. Hunger was a common experience in Tor’s short life; he merely tightened the dingy rags about his middle and continued to stare at the group of sparrows quarreling noisily in the red dust of the street. It had occurred to Tor that the life of a sparrow must be vastly pleasanter than that of a boy. “They find plenty to eat,” he told himself enviously, as he hugged his lean little body. With a sudden impulse the child flung a pebble into [pg 14]the midst of the belligerents. The birds shook the dust from their ruffled feathers with noisy clamor of dismay, darted into the bright air, and disappeared far above the tops of the tallest houses.
Tor laughed aloud as a second idea struggled with the first in his clouded brain; then he checked himself thoughtfully, and, winding his rags more closely about him, trotted noiselessly away down the street.
Chelluh, the blind beggar, for more years than one could count on the fingers of both hands the undisputed proprietor of a snug corner just within the Damascus gate, was shaking his brazen cup after his daily custom. The cup rattled bravely, for certain coins had already been dropped therein by the charitable.