“Round in Ewing street?”

“Yes.  Great game up, if I can only get on the track.”

“What is it?”

“There’s a cast-off baby in Dirty Alley, and Fan Bray knows its mother, and she’s rich.”

“What?”

“Fan’s getting lots of hush-money.”

“Goody! but that is game!”

“Isn’t it?  The baby’s owned by two beggar-women who board it in Dirty Alley.  It’s ’most starved and frozen to death, and Fan’s awful ’fraid it may die.  She wants me to steal it for her, so that she may have it better taken care of, and I was going to do it last night, when I got into a muss.”

“Who’s the woman that boards it?”

“She lives in a cellar, and is drunk every night.  Can steal the brat easily enough; but if I can’t find out who it belongs to, you see it will be trouble for nothing.”

“No, I don’t see any such thing,” answered Nell Peter.  “If you can’t get hush-money out of its mother, you can bleed Fanny Bray.”

“That’s so, and I’m going to bleed her.  The mother, you see, thinks the baby’s dead.  The proud old grandmother gave it away, as soon as was born, to a woman that Fan Bray found for her.  Its mother was out of her head, and didn’t know nothing.  That woman sold the baby to the women who keep it to beg with.  She’s gone up the spout now, and nobody knows who the mother and grandmother are but Fan, and nobody knows where the baby is but me and Fan.  She’s bleeding the old lady, and promises to share with me if I keep track of the baby and see that it isn’t killed or starved to death.  But I don’t trust her.  She puts me off with fives and tens, when I’m sure she gets hundreds.  Now, if we have the baby all to ourselves, and find out the mother and grandmother, won’t we have a splendid chance?  I’ll bet you on that.”

“Won’t we?  Why, Pinky, this is a gold-mine!”

“Didn’t I tell you there was great game up?  I was just wanting some one to help me.  Met you in the nick of time.”

The two girls had now reached Pinky’s room in Ewing street, where they continued in conference for a long time before settling their plans.

“Does Fan know where you live?” queried Nell Peter.

“Yes.”

“Then you will have to change your quarters.”

“Easily done.  Doesn’t take half a dozen furniture-cars to move me.”

“I know a room.”

“Where?”

“It’s a little too much out of the way, you’ll think, maybe, but it’s just the dandy for hiding in.  You cart keep the brat there, and nobody—­”

“Me keep the brat?” interrupted Pinky, with a derisive laugh.  “That’s a good one!  I see myself turned baby-tender!  Ha! ha! that’s funny!”

“What do you expect to do with the child after you steal it?” asked Pinky’s friend.

“I don’t intend to nurse it or have it about me.”

“What then?”

“Board if with some one who doesn’t get drunk or buy policies.”