“I oughter gone home,” Josiah said to himself as he trudged slowly along, his burden growing heavier each moment. “Now it begins to look as if I stood a good chance of being lost, and what’ll become of me if I don’t find Tom and Bob before dark?”

He made no attempt to answer his own question, but resolved to follow implicitly the directions given by the policeman, taking advantage of every opportunity to note the time, in order that he might not walk a single minute less than the full number set by the officer.

The half-hour came to an end, however, and the dark shadows of evening were beginning to lengthen, much to the young traveler’s uneasiness, when he arrived at an open square, at one end of which could be seen a number of cabs, and on either side horse-car after horse-car until Josiah fancied all of these vehicles ever made had been brought here for inspection.

He halted.

It was easier to wait for a policeman than to search for one; and he remained at what he afterward learned was the junction of the Bowery and Chatham Square, a long while without seeing any guardians of the peace.

A short distance below his halting-place, gaudy transparencies already lighted up the dime museums, and along the edge of the sidewalk was a row of street vendors, who were crying their wares in such a variety of tones as to make a most discordant noise.

The night was fast approaching.

It was necessary Josiah should ask some one to direct him to his friend’s home.

He was on the point of speaking with an Italian chestnut vendor, when a tiny girl, hardly more than ten years of age, clad in a ragged dress which had originally been brown, with the remains of a faded shawl over her shoulders, and the veriest apology of a straw hat on her head, stepped in front of him as she asked:—

“Don’t you want to buy some matches?”

Josiah dropped his valise and looked at her in astonishment. That a child so small should be out on the street at such an hour, was quite as surprising to him as that she should be insufficiently clad on a night when thick clothing seemed an absolute necessity.

He stood gazing at her as if she was some curiosity which had escaped from the museum below, until she repeated the question, and then he replied gravely:—

“I don’t believe so; you see, I haven’t learned to smoke, an’ what would I do with ’em?”

The girl continued her search for customers, Josiah watching her intently, forgetting for the time being his own forlorn condition as he noted the many efforts and equally as many failures to dispose of her wares.

Ten minutes passed, and she had not sold a single box.

Just for an instant there was a lull in the living tide, and the child had again approached Josiah, but without paying any attention to him.

“Do you sell matches all the time?” he asked.

“That’s what I have to do now. I tried to get into the newspaper business, but didn’t dare to jump on an’ off the cars same as the boys do, so couldn’t make very much at it.”

“It don’t strike me you’re earnin’ a great sight of money at what you’re doin’ now. Haven’t sold a thing since I’ve been standin’ here.”

“No,” she said with a half-suppressed sigh, “somehow people don’t seem to want to buy matches on the street. I got rid of ten cents’ worth to one man, though, this afternoon.’

“How much profit was there in the trade?”

The girl looked up at Josiah inquiringly.

The boy repeated his question in another form.

“How much money did you make when you sold that lot?”

“Oh! I get a couple of boxes for one cent an’ sell ’em for two, so half I take in is mine.”

“Do your folks live ’round here?”

“I haven’t got any. If I had I don’t reckon I’d be sellin’ matches.”

“I s’pose you live somewhere, though?”

“Oh, yes, old Mother Hunter lets me stay to her house for fifty cents a week.”

“S’pose you don’t have money enough to pay her?”

“Then I guess she’d make me leave, same as Miss Spear did.”

“Who’s Miss Spear?”

“She’s the woman I went to live with when mother died, and ’twas an awful place. She used to drink terrible, an’ two or three times gave me a downright good whippin’ ’cause I didn’t bring home as much money as she thought I oughter make.”

“What right did she have to whip you? She ain’t any relation, is she?”

“Of course not; but you see I was livin’ with her, an’ had to pay what I promised, though when trade was good she used to want more. So I got a chance to go with Mother Hunter.”

“Do you like this sort of business?”

“Indeed I don’t.”

“Why not try something else?”

“I wish I could. I thought I’d like to get a place in a store as cash girl, but I was so small nobody wanted me, an’ besides, I didn’t have any decent clothes. You see, if a girl like me gets that kind of a job, she’s got to dress up mighty fine.”

“Well,” Josiah said as he stepped back a few paces and surveyed her critically, “there’s one thing certain, you ain’t dressed very fine now.”

“I know it,” the girl said half apologetically, as she looked down at her faded gown; “but when a feller’s got on the best she owns, what you goin’ to do ’bout it?”

Josiah was unable to answer this question. He had never seen any one who looked so thoroughly wretched, as far as outside appearance was concerned, not even the tramps who occasionally stopped at the farm-house for food, and instinctively his hand went to that portion of his vest underneath which rested the huge pocket-book.

“I haven’t got much money,” he said slowly, as if weighing some important question in his mind; “but I’ll tell you what it is, little girl; I’m willin’ to give you some of it to help along, ’cause it don’t seem to me as if you was goin’ to earn much of anything to-night.”

The match-girl looked at him a moment, as if determining whether he was serious in making this generous offer, and then said with what might have been a laugh:—

“If you’re goin’ to stay in New York very long I guess you’ll need all the money you’ve brought, an’ I must take care of myself same’s I’ve been doin’. Say, where do you live?”

“At Berry’s Corner.”

“Where’s that?”

“Oh, it’s a good ways from here. I come in on the cars to visit Tom an’ Bob. They wasn’t at the station, an’ I’ve been huntin’ ever since for ’em. Looks like I was goin’ to have a pretty hard job. A policeman told me to keep right on walkin’ half an hour, an’ then ask the way, so I reckon it wouldn’t do any harm to find out if you know where Baker’s Court is?”

The girl stood for an instant as if in deepest thought, and then replied slowly:—

“No, I’m sure I don’t know anything about it. What street is it near?”

“The policeman said it led out of West Broadway.”

“Oh, I know where that is. It may be quite a ways though, an’ I wouldn’t like to leave here till business was over.”

“Will you go then?”

“Of course; there’s nothin’ else to do but to hang ’round Mother Hunter’s, an’ that ain’t very pleasant.”

“What’s your name?”

“Sadie Mitchell.”

Just at that moment conversation was interrupted by the tide of travel, which had set in once more past that particular spot; and Sadie bent all her energies to the disposal of her wares, while Josiah looked around for a convenient place in which to remain with his satchel until the business for the day could be brought to a close.

Now that he had the promise of a guide, and one in whom he felt every confidence, he no longer had any anxiety regarding his ability to find the friends whom he proposed to visit.

Not until night had come was the girl willing to abandon her efforts toward procuring the amount of money which Mother Hunter might demand; and, despite his occupation of watching the ever changing sea of faces before him, Josiah grew impatient.

“If we don’t start pretty soon I’m ’fraid we won’t get there before mornin’,” he said, with just a shade of petulance in his tones. “Is it very much of a walk from here?”

“It might be, an’ then again it mightn’t. You see, I don’t know how far out West Broadway it is. I’d have started sooner; but it’s been dreadful hard sellin’ matches to-night, an’ I expect there’ll be an awful row when I get home.”

“When are you goin’?”

“Now; but I must stop into the house just a minute before we try to find Baker’s Court.”

“When will you get supper?”

“Oh I’ll run across somethin’ by an’ by. I don’t s’pose Mother Hunter’s got much of anything, so it won’t take me long to do my eatin’.”

Josiah, who had been accustomed to having his meals regularly, was astonished at the indifference displayed by his new acquaintance regarding this matter; and as he looked at her critically while trying to learn whether she was attempting to make sport of him, the fact that he was decidedly hungry presented itself.

Owing to the excitement of the morning his breakfast had been a light one, and since then he had had nothing but candy with which to satisfy the cravings of his stomach.

What seemed like a very happy thought occurred to him.

“Is there any place ’round here where we could get somethin’ to eat?” he asked abruptly.

“Of course. You can go to the Jim Fisk restaurant an’ fill yourself up for fifteen cents; but that’s a good deal of money to give for one supper. When trade’s been good I sometimes pay a dime down to Mose Pearson’s for a great big bowl of soup, an’ as much bread an’ butter as I want.”

Josiah was silent a moment, and then said with the air of one who has fully decided an important matter:—

“Look here, Sadie, if you an’ I can get a big supper for fifteen cents, we’re goin’ to have it, though it will make me kinder short on the presents I was thinkin’ of buyin’ for father an’ mother; but they won’t care when I tell ’em how I spent it.”

The match-girl’s eyes opened wide with astonishment and delight.

“Do you really mean that?” she asked, evidently fancying he was making sport of her, and then added almost in the same breath, “I don’t think you’d better do anything of the kind. It’s too much to put out jest for the sake of swellin’.”

“I guess I can stand it,” Josiah said loftily. “I never was to the city before, an’ it ain’t likely’s I shall get here again very soon, so we’ll make the most of it while I’m on a good time. Besides, I must have somethin’ to eat, an’ I want you to stay with me so’s to show me where Tom an’ Bob live.”

Sadie made no further objection, for to have spread before her a fifteen-cent meal at the Jim Fisk restaurant seemed the acme of happiness.

“What will I do with my matches?” she asked.

“You haven’t got so many but I can put ’em in my pocket.”

“An’ I’ll carry the tray in my hand. You see, if I’m goin’ there with you I wouldn’t like folks to think I’d been standin’ out here since mornin’ sellin’ matches, an’ was blowin’ in all I’d made.”

“There’s no danger of that; they’ll believe we just come from the country, an’ have got more money than we know what to do with,” Josiah said with a consequential air as he lifted the heavy valise, and stood waiting for Sadie to lead the way.

With the prospect of such a meal before her the match-girl did not delay; and as soon as Josiah signified that he was ready, she started toward Chatham Street at a pace which caused the boy, burdened as he was, no slight difficulty to equal.

Both the young people were a little timid at entering such a magnificent establishment as this restaurant appeared to be; but, aided by one of the waiters, for business was not very brisk just at this time, they were soon seated at a table which might have looked more inviting had it been less conspicuous for coffee stains on the cloth.

“What do you want?” the waiter asked, with the air of one who is not disposed to spend too much time upon his customers.

“Bring us all you’ve got for fifteen cents apiece,” Josiah replied; and the man repeated the order in what seemed to the boy from the country like a foreign tongue.

“Ain’t this just gorgeous?” Sadie whispered when they were comparatively alone. “I never was in here but twice before, an’ I’d be perfectly happy if I could always eat in such a fine place.”

“You ought to come out to the farm an’ see how mother gets supper,” Josiah said proudly. “We always have clean table-cloths, an’ the dishes ain’t so heavy’s these; though I don’t know but the more they weigh the more they cost,” he added reflectively.

Then he described to her his home at Berry’s Corner; told her of Towser and the pet calf, until once more the sickness for home assailed him.

The sight of the food, however, had a beneficial effect upon his mind; and in a very short time the vision of the Shindle Farm had faded away in the distance, leaving before him the pleasing knowledge that he was hungry, and had plenty with which to satisfy that desire.

To Sadie the half-hour spent in the restaurant was one of unalloyed pleasure. She thought everything around her was magnificent, and fancied that in no other place could food be prepared in such an inviting and appetizing manner.

“There!” she said as she ate the last kernel of rice which had helped to make up the pudding, and the meal was at an end, “Now I don’t care what Mother Hunter says. I ain’t hungry any more, an’ it don’t seem as if I ever will be agin. What a lucky thing for me you happened to come along, an’ wanted to find your chums. I expect I’ll be waitin’ ’round here every night hopin’ to see somebody from Berry’s Corner, so’s to have such an awful good time as we’ve had.”

To Josiah the supper had not been particularly appetizing, owing to the fact that he was contrasting the food with that prepared by his mother, and the result was decidedly in favor of the meals at the Shindle Farm.

It made him very comfortable in mind that he had been able to give the little match-girl so much pleasure, however; and, after emerging from the restaurant to where the gaudy lights of the dime museum could be seen, another brilliant scheme entered his mind.

“Say, how much do they charge to go in there?” he asked.

“Ten cents.”

“Then we’ll go.”

“That will make half a dollar you’ve spent since you saw me, an’ it’s too much for one day,” Sadie said in a whisper, as if the enormous amount terrified her.

“I don’t care if it’s a dollar, we’re goin’ into that circus,” Josiah said resolutely, as he changed his valise from one hand to the other in order to rest his arm, and walked rapidly toward what was announced by the posters to be the “Oriental Palace of Wonders.”

Two kids facing each other in the street