“Sure, an’ ye shall go, ‘vourneen, if it’s that bad ye’re wantin’ it,” said she, stooping to take the child in her arms; and, as Cherry kissed her again and again, she added,—­

“An’ it’s well ye don’t ask the heart out uv me body; for it’s inter yer hand I’d have to give it, colleen bawn.”

Giovanni looked on, his half-shut, black eyes glittering, and a wily smile wrinkling his sallow cheek.

“Every one has his day,” muttered he in Italian, “Your’s to-day, good woman; mine to-morrow.”

Half an hour later, Cherry, dressed as neatly as her foster-mother’s humble means and taste would allow, and her face glowing with pleasure and excitement, skipped out of the door of the tenement-house, looking like the fairy princess in a pantomime as she suddenly emerges from the hovel where she has been hidden.

Giovanni followed, carrying a bundle, and his violin wrapped in papers.  These, he explained to Mrs. Ginniss, were only some matters he had to leave with a friend as he went along; but he should not go into any house, or take the little girl anywhere but for the walk he had mentioned.

“Faix, an’ it’s mighty ginteel ye are, anyway, Misther Jovarny,” said the Irishwoman, watching the pair from the window of her attic as they walked slowly up the street.  “But I’m afther wishin’ I’d said no whin I said yis.  Nor yet I couldn’t tell why, more than that Teddy’ll be mad to hear she’s been wid him.  But the b’y hasn’t sinse whin it’s about the little sisther he’s talkin’.  He thinks the ground isn’t good enough for her to walk on, nor goold bright enough for her to wear.”

So saying, Mrs. Ginniss closed the window, and, throwing a little shawl over her head, locked the door, leaving the key underneath, and hurried away to her sick friend, with whom she staid till nearly night.

Giovanni and Cherry, meantime, walked gayly on, chatting, now of the wonderful things about them, now of the yet more wonderful scenes they were to visit.  At a confectioner’s shop, in a shady by-street, they stopped to rest for a while; and the Italian provided his little guest with ice-creams, cakes, and candies, to her heart’s content.

“I like these better than potatoes and pork-meat.  I used to eat these in heaven,” said the little girl, pausing to look at a macaroon, and then finishing it with a relish.

The Italian laughed.

“Canary-birds do not feed with crows,” said he.  “When we are rich, picciola, you shall never eat worse than this.”

“Shall we be rich soon, ’Varny?” asked the child eagerly.

“Upon the moment almost, if you will dance and laugh, and look so pretty as you can, always.”

“But we needn’t stop to be very rich before we go and carry some of the nice things to mammy,” rejoined Cherry anxiously.

“No, no, indeed!  We will but make a little turn in the country, and come back princes.  But mind you this, picciola:  I am to be your father now, or all the same; and I shall tell every one that you are my own little girl:  so you must never say, ‘Not so.’”