Mr. Maloney's manner had lost much of its assurance. "But the boy must be taught something," he declared. "He's ignorant!" Ignorant! Johnnie rose, scarcely able to keep back a protest. Barber whirled round upon him. "Ignorant!" he cried. "Y' hear that, Johnnie? This gent thinks you don't know nothin'!--That's where you're off, Maloney!--Johnnie, suppose you read for him. Ha? Just show him how ignorant y' are!" Johnnie made an involuntary start toward the drawer of the table, remembered, and stopped. "What--what'll I read?" he asked. The man looked around. "Exactly!" he exclaimed. "What'll he read? What have you got in this flat _for_ him to read? Where's your books? or papers? or magazines? You haven't a scrap of printed matter, as far as I can see." "Give us that paper out of your overcoat," suggested Big Tom, ignoring what the other had said. "Let the kid read from it." As Johnnie took the paper, he was almost as put out at the man as was Barber. "I've read ever since I was a baby," he declared. "Aunt Sophie, she used to give me lessons." Then he read, easily, smoothly, pausing at commas, stopping at periods, pronouncing even the biggest words correctly. "All right," interrupted Maloney, after a few paragraphs. "That'll do. You read first rate--first rate." "And I know dec'mals," boasted Johnnie; "and fractions. And I can spell ev'ry word that was in Cis's spellin' book." Yes, and he knew much more that he dared not confess in the hearing of Barber. He longed to discourse about his five books, and all the wonderful people in them, and to say something about the "thinks" he could do. "There y' are!" exclaimed the longshoreman, triumphant. "There y' are! D' y' call that ignorant? for a ten-year-old boy?" Maloney looked across at Johnnie and smiled. "He's a _mighty_ smart lad!" he admitted warmly. "Knows twice as much as most boys of his age," went on Barber. (He had come to this conclusion, however, in the past five minutes.) "And all he knows is good. He behaves himself pretty fair, too, and I don't have much trouble with him t' speak of. So he's welcome t' stay on far's _he's_ concerned. But"--his voice hardened, his nose darted sidewise menacingly--"if _you_ stick your finger in this pie, and drag me up in front of a Court, I'm goin' t' tell y' what'll come of it, and I mean just what I say: I'll set the kid outside that door,"--indicating the one leading to the hall, "and the city can board and bed him. Jus' put _that_ in your pipe and smoke it!" Evidently Mr. Maloney did not smoke, for though Johnnie watched the visitor closely, the latter drew out no pipe. "Wouldn't know where I could send him," he confessed, but as if to himself rather than to Big Tom; "not just now, anyhow. But"--suddenly brightening--"what about night school?"