"A boy by our block," answered Morris, "is got one. He is lovin' much mit that dog und that dog is lovin' much mit him."
"Well, now, perhaps you could teach Rover to walk on his hind legs, and carry things in his mouth," suggested Teacher; "and as for this new little Christian friend of yours——"
"I don't know be he a Krisht," Morris admitted with reluctant candor; "he ain't said nothin' over it to me. On'y a Irisher lady what lives by our house, she says mine friend is a Irisher."
"Very well, dear; then of course he's a Christian," Miss Bailey assured him, "and I shan't interfere with you to-morrow—you may stay at home and play with him. But we can't let it go on, you know. This kind of thing never would do when your mother comes back from the hospital. She might not want your friend in the house. Have you thought of that at all, Morris? You must make your friend understand it."
"I tells him," Morris promised; "I don't know can he understand. He's pretty little, only that's how I tells him all times."
"Then tell him once again, honey," Miss Bailey advised, "and make him understand that he must go back to his own people as soon as your mother is well. Where are his own people? I can't understand how any one so little could be wandering about with no one to take care of him."
"Teacher, I'm takin' care of him," Morris pointed out.
All that night and all the succeeding day Miss Bailey's imagination reverted again and again to the two little ones keeping house in Mrs. Mowgelewsky's immaculate apartment. Even increasing blindness had not been allowed to interfere with sweeping and scrubbing and dusting, and when Teacher thought of that patient matron, as she lay in her hospital cot trusting so securely to her Christian friend's guardianship of her son and home, she fretted herself into feeling that it was her duty to go down to Monroe Street and investigate.
There was at first no sound when, after climbing endless stairs, she came to Mrs. Mowgelewsky's door. But as the thumping of the heart and the singing in her ears abated somewhat, she detected Morris's familiar treble.
"Bread," it said, "iss awful healthy for you, only you dasn't eat it 'out chewin'. I never in my world seen how you eats."