I. Happy Home in Sunrise Alley
II. Moccasins and Lady Slippers
III. S.O.S.
IV. “Bearer of Morning”
V. Little Brother
VI. The Song of a Bird
VII. Peaches’ Preference in Blessings
VIII. Big Brother
IX. James Jr. and Malcolm
X. The Wheel of Life
XI. The Advent of Nancy and Peter
XII. Feminine Reasoning
XIII. A Safe Proposition
XIV. An Orphans’ Home
XV. A Particular Nix
XVI. The Fingers in the Pie
XVII. Initiations in an Ancient and Honourable
Brotherhood
XVIII. Malcolm and the Hermit Thrush
XIX. Establishing Protectorates
XX. Mickey’s Miracle
Happy Home in Sunrise Alley
“Aw kid, come on! Be square!”
“You look out what you say to me.”
“But ain’t you going to keep your word?”
“Mickey, do you want your head busted?”
“Naw! But I did your work so you could
loaf; now I want the pay you promised me.”
“Let’s see you get it! Better
take it from me, hadn’t you?”
“You’re twice my size; you know I can’t,
Jimmy!”
“Then you know it too, don’t you?”
“Now look here kid, it’s ’cause
you’re getting so big that folks will be buying
quicker of a little fellow like me; so you’ve
laid in the sun all afternoon while I been running
my legs about off to sell your papers; and when the
last one is gone, I come and pay you what they sold
for; now it’s up to you to do what you promised.”
“Why didn’t you keep it when you had
it?”
“’Cause that ain’t business!
I did what I promised fair and square; I was giving
you a chance to be square too.”
“Oh! Well next time you won’t
be such a fool!”
Jimmy turned to step from the gutter to the sidewalk.
Two things happened to him simultaneously: Mickey
became a projectile. He smashed with the force
of a wiry fist on the larger boy’s head, while
above both, an athletic arm gripped him by the collar.
Douglas Bruce was hurrying to see a client before
he should leave his office; but in passing a florist’s
window his eye was attracted by a sight so beautiful
he paused an instant, considering. It was spring;
the Indians were coming down to Multiopolis to teach
people what the wood Gods had put into their hearts
about flower magic.
