Now Freddie did not know it, but this was in fact the most important question that had ever been put to him in his life. Everything depended on his answer; if he said no, we might as well stop this story right here; if he said yes---- "Yes, sir," said Freddie. "All right. If anybody comes in, just tell 'em to wait." Freddie left Aunt Amanda, sitting very still, and gazing out of the window, with her hands folded in her lap, and followed Mr. Toby into the shop. "All right, sonny," said Mr. Toby, "make yourself comfortable. I'll be back in a jiffy. If anybody comes in, you tell 'em to wait." And with that he went out of the door and up the street. Freddie was left alone in the shop. Everything was very quiet now, for it was beginning to be twilight, and all the people seemed to be indoors. He knew he ought to be going home, but he had promised to mind the shop, and it would never do to leave before Mr. Toby came back. The street door and the door to Aunt Amanda's room were both closed. He sat down on the chair by the front window and looked out across the bull-dog's head. He thought of Bobby and his little sister in Sunday-school, and that led him to think of the hymn that did him so much good: "Yield not to temptation, For yielding is sin." He sang that tune to himself for a while, and he found himself singing other tunes, and finally one which began: "There was an old codger, and he had a wooden leg, And he never bought tobacco when tobacco he could beg." Tobacco! There was a world of tobacco on those shelves. Smoking tobacco, and churchwarden pipes. He strolled around behind the counter, and let down the back of the show-case. There were the churchwarden pipes; he selected one and took it out. It tasted cold and clammy when he put it in his mouth, and he wondered what it would taste like with tobacco in it. He brought the little ladder and got up on it, facing the shelves, and to his surprise he found himself looking directly into the slanting eyes of the porcelain Chinaman's head. He stood there gazing thoughtfully into those eyes, and singing to himself the verse which was always such a help to him: "Yield not to temptation, For yielding is sin, Each vict'ry will help you Some other to win." It was growing a little darker now, and he could not examine the Chinaman's head very well without bringing it closer. He took the head in his hands, lifted it from the shelf, got down off the ladder, and sat down on the floor with his back against the counter; and while he was doing this he hummed to himself the next part of his tune: "Fight manfully onward, Dark passions subdue."