Dogger's arms were full. “I've a silk dress,” he puffed, “and a ruffled petticoat, and a great leghorn hat--and just look at these feathers, and you never saw such a pair of slippers and silk stockings! And now let's try 'em on!” The child uttered a little scream of delight. “Oh, Uncle Felix! Isn't it lovely? Can't I have them? Please, Uncle Felix!” she cried, both hands around his shirt collar in supplication. “Take 'em all, missy,” shouted Sam. Then, turning to Felix: “They belonged to an actor who hired half of my studio and left them to pay for his rent, which they didn't do, not by a long chalk, and--Oh, here's another hat--and, oh, such a lovely old cloak! Yes, take 'em all, missy--I'm glad to get rid of 'em--before Nat claps them on Jane and goes in for Puritan maidens and Lady Gay Spankers. Oh, I know you, Nat! I wouldn't trust you out of my sight! Take 'em along, I say.” He stopped and turned toward Felix again. “Couldn't you bring her down here once in a while, Mr. O'Day?” he continued, a strange, pathetic note in his wheezing voice. “Just for ten minutes, you know, when she's out with the dog, or walking with you. Nobody ever comes up these stairs but tramps and book agents--even the models steer clear. It would help a lot if you'd bring her. Wouldn't you like to come, missy? What did you say her name was? Oh, yes--Masie--well, my child, that's not what I'd call you; I'd call you--well, I guess I wouldn't call you anything but just a dear, darling little girl! Yes, that's just what I'd call you. And you are going to let me give them to her, aren't you, Mr. O'Day?” Felix grasped the old fellow's thin, dry hand in his own strong fingers. For an instant a strange lump in his throat clogged his speech. “Of course, I'll take the costumes, and many thanks for your wish to make the child happy,” he answered at last. “I am rather foolish about Masie myself; and may I tell you, Mr. Dogger, that you are a very fine old gentleman, and that I am delighted to have made your acquaintance, and that, if you will permit me I shall certainly come again?” Dogger was about to reply when Masie, Looking up into the wizened face, cried: “And may I put them on when I like, if I'm very, very--oh, so VERY careful?” “Yes, you buttercup, and you can wear them full of holes and do anything else you please to them, and I won't care a mite.” And then, with Jane Hoggson's help, he put on Masie's own hat and coat, which Ganger had hung on an easel, and Masie called Fudge from his mouse-hole, and Felix shook hands first with Nat and then with Sam, and last of all with Jane, who looked at him askance out of one eye as she bobbed him half a courtesy. And then everybody went out into the hall and said good-by once more over the banisters, Felix with the bundle under his arm, Masie throwing kisses to the two old gnomes craning their necks over the banisters, Fudge barking every step of the way down the stairs. Chapter VI