"But your parents?" demanded Ricketts. "Where are they?"
"Me what?" asked the boy.
"Your parents—your father and mother?" explained Ricketts.
"I ain't never had no mudder," said the boy. "But me fadder—well, me an' him had a scrap over me wages las' summer, and I ain't seen him since."
"Your wages, eh?" smiled Ricketts. The idea of this little tad earning wages struck him as being rather humorous.
"He t'ought I ought to give him de whole wad," said the boy, "and when he licked me for spendin' a nickel on meself and a fr'en' o' mine las' Fourth o' July, I give him de skidoo."
"I see," said Ricketts, regarding the little guest with a singular light in his eye. "You've got a fine lot of stuff here from old Santa Claus, haven't you?"
"What, me?" asked the boy, gazing earnestly into Ricketts' face. "Is dese here t'ings for me?"
"Why, of course," said Ricketts. "Old Daddy Santa Claus on his rounds last night found you occupying a handsome apartment on Fifth Avenue, but the steam heat had been turned off, and, fearing you might catch cold, he picked you up and brought you to his own home. He'd been looking for you all day."
"And dese is—really—fer me?" cried the child.