When the father died, a tall man, who carried a sword and wore spurs, and had two rows of brass buttons down the front of his coat, took the dog and the wagon and the Punch and Judy show and sold ’em all—­so as to get money to pay the funeral expenses of the dead man.

The tall man with the sword might have sold little Mariano, too, or thrown him in with the lot for good measure, but nobody seemed to want the boy—­they all had more boys than they really needed already.

A fat market-woman gave the lad a cake, and another one gave him two oranges, and still another market-woman, fatter than the rest, blew her nose violently on her check apron and said it was too bad a boy like that didn’t have a mother.

Mariano never had a mother—­at least none that he knew of, and it really seemed as if it didn’t make much difference, but now he began to cry, and, since the fat woman had suggested it, really wished he had a mother, after all.

There was an old priest standing by in the group.  Mariano had not noticed him.  But when the priest said, “But God is both our father and our mother, so no harm can come to us!” Mariano looked up in his face and felt better.

The priest’s name was Father Gonzales; Mariano knew, because this is what the market-woman called him.  The fat market-woman talked with the priest, and the priest talked with the man with the dangling sword, and then Father Gonzales took the boy by the hand and led him away, and Mariano trotted along by his side, quite content, save for a stifled wish that the big yellow dog might go too.  And it is a gross error to suppose that a yellow dog is necessarily nothing but a canine whose capillary covering is highly charged with ocherish pigment.

Where they were going made no difference.  “God is our father and our mother”—­Father Gonzales said so—­and, faith! he ought to know.

And by and by they came to the tall old tenement-house, and climbed up the stairs to where Mariano’s old “grandfather” lived.  Perhaps he wasn’t Mariano’s sure-enough grandfather, but he was just as good as if he had been.

* * * * *

But now it was an awfully long time ago since little Mariano and Father Gonzales had first climbed the stairs to where Grandfather Fortuny lived.  The old grandfather and Mariano worked very hard, but they were quite content and happy.  They had enough to eat, and each had a straw bed and warm blankets to cover him at night, and when the weather was very cold they made a fire of charcoal in a brazier and sat before it with spread-out hands, very thankful that God had given them such a good home and so many comforts.

The grandfather made images out of white plaster, flowers sometimes, and curious emblems that people bought for votive offerings.  Little Mariano’s share in the work was to color the figures with blue and red paint, and give a lifelike tint to the fruit and bouquets that the grandfather cast from the white plaster.