He ran between the two men, and put up his little dirty fingers upon his father’s big, clenched hand; he repeated piteously, “Father, Fa--ther, Fa--ther!” But more than this the little fellow had not time to say. The father’s dark, red face turned a sudden, ominous purple, and before any person of them all could stay him his brutal hand had turned upon the child. Cries of shame and horror rose from the crowd; a woman’s shriek echoed from a window across the street, and the screams of the boy pierced the bedlam. The Italian, partly sobered, had slunk back. “Stop him! Part them! Hold him, somebody! He’ll kill the child!” yelled the bystanders, and not a man of them stirred. “Why, it’s only a _baby_!” cried the girl in the reefer, running up. “He’ll murder it! Oh, if I was a _man_!” she raved, wringing her hands. At that moment, before one could have lifted the eyelash to see how it fell, a well-aimed blow struck the brute beneath the ear. He fell. Hands snatched the writhing child away; his mother’s arms and screams received him; and over the fallen man a slight, tall figure was seen to tower. The stranger had thrown down his valise, and tossed off his silk hat. His delicate face was as white as a star. He quivered with holy rage. He trampled on the fellow with one foot, and ground him down; he had the attitude of the St. Michael in Guido’s great picture. He had that scorn and all that beauty. A geyser of oaths spurted from the prostrate ruffian. The stranger stooped, and pinned him skillfully until they ceased. “Now,” he said calmly, “get up. Get up, I say!” He released his clenched white hand from the other’s grimy flesh. “He’ll thresh the life outen ye!” protested a voice from the increasing crowd. “You don’t know Job Slip ’s well ’s we do. He’ll make short work on ye, sir, if you darst let go him.” “No, he won’t,” replied the stranger quietly. “He respects a good blow when he feels it. He knows how it ought to be planted. He would do as much himself, if he saw a man killing his own child. Wouldn’t you, Job Slip?” He stepped back fearlessly and folded his arms. The rapidly sobering sot struggled to his feet, and instinctively squared off; looked at the gentleman blindly for a moment, then dropped his huge arms. “Goshamighty!” he said, “who in ---- are _you_?” He took one of the stranger’s delicate hands in his black and bleeding palms, and critically examined it. “_That?_ Why, my woman’s paw is stronger ’n’ bigger ’n _that_!” contemptuously. “And you didn’t overdo it neither. Pity! If you’d only made it manslaughter--why, I could ha’ sent ye up on my antumortim deppysition.” “Oh, I knew better than that,” replied the stranger calmly, turning for his hat. He thought of the boxing-lessons that he used to take on the Back Bay, years ago. Some one in the crowd brushed off the hat with the back of a dusty elbow, and handed it respectfully to the gentleman. The girl in the reefer picked up his valise.