“How are you going to do it?” Julia asked. “If you went in there and tried to take them they would throw you out.” “Well, how can I do it? Any way you say.” She thought a long time before she answered: “I could tie them in a sheet and throw them out the window into the alley, kid, to you.” This wasn’t heroic enough to suit me, but it sounded practical. I wanted to help her, so I consented. “And how are you going to get away if I get your clothes?” She thought again. “This week, kid, you hunt up some hack driver you can trust and tell him what you want to do. You can have him in the alley with his hack. I’ll throw the clothes out. You put them in the hack. Then I’ll come downstairs, go out through the kitchen, and over the back fence into the alley. Nobody will pay any attention to me going out in my parlor wrapper without a hat. “Next Saturday when you come with your bill I’ll see you in the hall and tell you what night to come and what time.” Julia was herself again; all animation, chattering like a sparrow. “It can’t fail, kid. I can feel myself out of there already. All you have to do is get a hack driver, a big, tough one that won’t get scared and run away. That’s all settled, and it’s time for me to get back to Miss Kate’s. It’s not so hard to go now.” Again she insisted on paying the bill. I said good night in front of the restaurant. She shook hands with me heartily, boyishly; her hand was hard, firm, and her grip something to inspire confidence. “Saturday,” she said, darting away. I went home with my chest out, my shoulders up in the air, and my head high. I thought of all my heroes. No, I wouldn’t trade places with any of them. Here was real work to do. I must find a hack driver, “a big, tough one.” Cocky McAllister was tough enough. A lean, hungry pirate with a balky eye, who cruised about my neighborhood with his spavined horses and rickety hack. I told him what I wanted. “Never let it be said that I refused to help any young feller get himself a girl and get up in the world,” he declared. “Say when. I’ll be on the spot an’ it won’t cost you a dime, either.” Julia was waiting Saturday when I got to Madam Kate’s. “Did you get a driver, kid?” “Yes.” “Be in the alley to-morrow night at eight.” I promised to be there. That night I found Cocky and readied him up for Sunday evening. He showed up on the minute, and we were in the alley by Madam Kate’s early. Julia was waiting at the window and out came the bundle. I threw it into the hack. A minute later Cocky snatched her off the fence, leaving part of her wrapper behind. More of it was streaming out of the hack door as I slammed it and we drove away. She wiped the powder and rouge off her face. “No more of that stuff,” she said. On the way back to my neighborhood she spotted a “Housekeeping Rooms” sign in the window of a dingy-looking house. She stopped the hack and put some money in my hand. “Dash up there, kid, and hire a room, anything that’s vacant.”