"Yes, 'out fryin'. Ain't I told you little girls could to have fraids over 'em? Boys could to have fraids too," cried Isaac; and then spurred on by the calm of his rival, he added: "The rubber-neck-boat-birds they hollers somethin' fierce." "I wouldn't be afraid of them. Me pop's a cop," cried Patrick stoutly. "I'd just as lief set on 'em. I'd like to." "Ah, but you ain't seen 'em, und you ain't heard 'em holler," Isaac retorted. "Well, I'm goin' to. An' I'm goin' to see the lions an' the tigers an' the el'phants, an' I'm goin' to ride on the water-lake." "Oh, how I likes I should go too!" Eva broke out. "O-o-oh, _how_ I likes I should look on them things! On'y I don't know do I need a ride on somethings what hollers. I don't know be they fer me." "Well, I'll take ye with me if your mother leaves you go," said Patrick grandly. "An' ye can hold me hand if ye're scared." "Me too?" implored Morris. "Oh, Patrick, c'n I go too?" "I guess so," answered the Leader of the Line graciously. But he turned a deaf ear to Isaac Borrachsohn's implorings to be allowed to join the party. Full well did Patrick know of the grandeur of Isaac's holiday attire and the impressionable nature of Eva's soul, and gravely did he fear that his own Sunday finery, albeit fashioned from the blue cloth and brass buttons of his sire, might be outshone. At Eva's earnest request, Sadie, her cousin, was invited, and Morris suggested that the Monitor of the Window Boxes should not be slighted by his colleagues of the goldfish and the line. So Nathan Spiderwitz was raised to Alpine heights of anticipation by visions of a window box "as big as blocks and streets," where every plant, in contrast to his lanky charges, bore innumerable blossoms. Ignatius Aloysius Diamantstein was unanimously nominated a member of the expedition; by Patrick, because they were neighbours at St. Mary's Sunday-school; by Morris, because they were classmates under the same Rabbi at the synagogue; by Nathan, because Ignatius Aloysius was a member of the "Clinton Street gang"; by Sadie, because he had "long pants sailor suit"; by Eva, because the others wanted him. Eva reached home that afternoon tingling with anticipation and uncertainty. What if her mother, with one short word, should close forever the gates of joy and boat-birds? But Mrs. Gonorowsky met her small daughter's elaborate plea with the simple question: "Who pays you the car-fare?" "Does it need car-fare to go?" faltered Eva. "Sure does it," answered her mother. "I don't know how much, but some it needs. Who pays it?" "Patrick ain't said." "Well, you should better ask him," Mrs. Gonorowsky advised, and, on the next morning, Eva did. She thereby buried the leader under the ruins of his fallen castle of clouds, but he struggled through them with the suggestion that each of his guests should be her, or his, own banker. "But ain't you got _no_ money 't all?" asked the guest of honour.