Produced by Al Haines [Frontispiece: "Joy, darling Joy," Patience said, "you have often said you had wished you had known your mother." _Page_. 167. _Little Miss Joy._ BY EMMA MARSHALL, AUTHOR OF "LITTLE QUEENIE;" "BLUE BELL;" "ROBERT'S RACE;" "HURLY-BURLY;" ETC. NEW EDITION. JOHN F. SHAW (1928) & CO., LTD. _Publishers,_ 3, PILGRIM STREET, LONDON, E.C.4. 1892 PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN AT THE ANCHOR PRESS, TIPTREE, ESSEX CONTENTS. _CHAPTER I._ WAITING AND WATCHING _CHAPTER II._ LITTLE MISS JOY _CHAPTER III._ "AN HONEST BOY" _CHAPTER IV._ HIS OWN WAY _CHAPTER V._ A TEA-PARTY IN THE ROW _CHAPTER VI._ A VISIT TO THE SKINNERS _CHAPTER VII._ DARK DOINGS _CHAPTER VIII._ IN PERIL OF THE SEA _CHAPTER IX._ ON THE WIDE, WIDE SEA _CHAPTER X._ "ONLY A LITTLE BOX" _CHAPTER XI._ MR. SKINNER IN COMMAND _CHAPTER XII._ THE SPIRIT OF PEACE _CHAPTER XIII._ A TOKEN AT LAST _CHAPTER XIV._ THE WAITING IS OVER _CHAPTER XV._ THE HERITAGE OF PEACE LITTLE MISS JOY. CHAPTER I. _WAITING AND WATCHING._ The sea lay calm and still under a cloudless sky. The tide was out, and there was only a faint murmur like the whisper of gentle voices, as the little waves told to the sands that they were coming back soon, for the tide had turned. It was yet early morning, and the old town of Great Yarmouth was asleep. The fishing boats had been out all night, and were lying like so many black birds with folded wings, waiting for the flow of the water to bring them to the beach. All the blinds were down in the houses facing the level strand. There was no one moving yet, for the resonant clock of Saint Nicholas Church had only just struck four. The children of visitors to Yarmouth, tired with their exertions on the sand the evening before, were all wrapt in profound slumber. Happy seaside children, who had paddled and delved on the beach to their hearts' content, who had braved all the reproaches of mothers and nurses, and had gone home with their buckets full of seaweed, pebbles, and shells, looking like the veriest little ragged waifs and strays, who were known as "the beach children," and who were an ever-moving population gathered from the depths of the town, pattering with naked feet round the boats as they came to shore, to pick up odd fish which fell from the nets as they were spread out to dry.