Whereupon Pearl and Peggy threw their arms about each other’s necks and the two boys rolled over in ecstasy.
“So that is what you’ve been working on, uncle?” asked Bobby when he had finally come once more to his feet.
“Yes. You gave me the idea, Bobby. You know you’re always doing what other people are doing. You’re always taking somebody off.”
“Like a policeman?” inquired Pearl. “Well,” she went on to explain, “the policeman on our beat sometimes takes people off. I saw him once myself.”
While Peggy, drawing Pearl aside, instructed her in the meaning of the expression on this occasion, Mr. Compton proceeded:
“The idea came to me on the day you took off that Delsarte girl and got wooled for your pains. It struck me that I could build up a story on the idea of four entirely different children, different in their surroundings, their station in life, their education and their refinement, being brought together. The tenement girl is thrown in with the daughter of a magnate; and the son of the same magnate is thrown in with a tough little kid who is by way of developing into a first-rate pickpocket.”
“Something like the first part of Oliver Twist?” ventured Peggy.
“In a way, yes. But here’s the difference: No children are really bad, and some who are on the way to wickedness may have splendid qualities. And that’s the way it is to be in this play. All four children are to have splendid qualities. Francis will be the tough boy; but he is naturally kind and brave. Bobby will be the magnate’s son—good, but sissified. Peggy will be a child of the tenements, rough in her ways and uncouth. You, Pearl, will be the magnate’s daughter, nice as pie, but babyish. And you and Peggy will fall to liking each other just the same as Bobby and Francis. And here’s where the difference comes in from the story of Oliver Twist. Because you like each other you will each try to resemble each other. What Peggy admires in Pearl she will try to be; and Pearl will try to resemble Peggy in her best qualities. You see the idea?”
“Where’s the action coming in?” asked Francis.
“Oh, that’s another thing. A kidnaper steals the magnate’s two children. He puts the girl in a tenement in charge of Peggy’s father, and puts the boy with a friend who is a thief and a maker of thieves. Peggy and Francis, their children, are won over by love to your side, Bobby. They help you to escape. Francis and Bobby succeed in escaping first. Then Francis traces you girls, and he and Bobby contrive to get you free. You tramp along the road until, footsore and weary, you happen upon the home of a kind and fairly wealthy married couple. It is there that Peggy and Pearl, who have long danced together, teach you, and it is there that Bobby’s and Pearl’s mother unexpectedly arrives, and clasps her children to her arms, and Francis doesn’t have to pick pockets or Peggy sell newspapers any more. The magnate and his family find that their boy and girl have kept all their good qualities and gained many new ones, while, as for Peggy and Francis, they have so changed that no friend of former days would know them. And so you live happily ever afterwards.”