When she had assured him that red was a most desirable color for hair, since it meant a splendid fighting spirit, he had to know all she could tell him about priests, which was a good deal. "They can marry you, and they can bury you," she began. "And they preach, and pray about a hundred times as much as anybody else, and that's one reason why he's so good. If you've done anything wicked, though, you've got to tell a priest about it, and----" "I'll tell him about the toothbrush," promised Johnnie. "I won't mind tellin' him, some way or other, anyhow, and it's bothered me, Cis, quite a lot--oh, yes, it has!" Cis did not mind the Father's knowing about their bargain; provided, however, that she herself be allowed to tell Mr. Perkins. She felt better already in her conscience, she declared, and even sang as she set about rearranging her roses. Each one of these she named with a girl's name, Johnnie assisting; and the two were able, by the curl of a petal, or the number of leaves on a stem, or some other tiny sign, to tell Cora from Alice, and Elaine from Blanchefleur, and the Princess Mary from Buddir al Buddoor, as well as to recognize Rebecca, and Julia, and Anastasia, and Gertie, and June--and so on through a list that made little godmothers to the rosebuds out of Cis's favorite acquaintances at the paper-box factory. Big Tom had little to say when he returned, but that little was pleasant enough. When he went to bed, he left his door wide. Grandpa had been allowed to stay beside the kitchen window, and there Cis brought a quilt and pillow, her own room being unbearably close and hot. As for Johnnie, quite openly and boldly he shouldered his roll of bedding and took it to the roof! (For after what Father Pat had told them that day, could he, being a boy, fail to do the daring thing? Also, were they not now under the protecting care of a red-headed fighter?) Arrived on the roof, he did not lie down, but walked to and fro. A far-off band was playing in the summer night, at some pier or in an open space, and its music could be faintly heard. Children were shouting as they returned from the Battery. The grind of street cars came in low waves, not unlike the rhythmic beat of the seas which he had never seen. He shut his ears to every sound. Eastward loomed up the iron network of the bridges, delicate and beautiful against the starlit sky. South, and near by, clustered the masts of scores of ships. North and West were the sky-piercing tops of the city's highest buildings. Sights as well as sounds were softened and glorified by the night, and by distance. But he saw--as he heard--nothing of what was around him. He felt himself lifted high above it all--away from it.