“No, I haven’t got any of them, but I got a nice football.  Here I show you!”

“I don’t want a football.  You can’t play football when the snow is on the ground!” exclaimed Bert, as the man started toward some shelves on the other side of the room.

“I want a doll,” whispered Flossie.  “Just a little doll.”

“A doll!” exclaimed the man.  “Sure I gots a fine lot of dolls.  See!”

Quickly he held out a large one with very blue eyes and hair just like Flossie’s.

“Only a dollar seventy-five,” he said.  “Very cheap!”

“Oh, that’s too much!” exclaimed Nan.  “We haven’t that much money.  She wants only a little ten-cent doll.”

“Oh, well, I have them kinds too!” said the man, in disappointed tones.  “Here you are!”

He held out one that did not appear to be very nice.

“You can get those for five cents in the other stores,” whispered Nell.

“Better take it,” said her brother.  “Then I’ll ask about the dishes.”

“Yes, we’ll take it,” agreed Nan.

So Flossie was given her doll, and, even though it might have been only five cents somewhere else, she liked it just as well.

“What else you wants to buy, childrens?” asked the old man.  “I got lots more things so cheap—­oh, so very cheap!”

Billy and Bert strolled over to the window.  They looked down in.  Nan crowded to their side.  She felt sure, now, that the two pieces of china were the very ones Miss Pompret wanted.  If they could only get that sugar bowl and pitcher!

“I wish you had a sailboat!” murmured Billy, as if that was all he cared about.  Then, turning to Nan he asked:  “Would you like that sugar bowl and pitcher?”

“Oh, yes, I think I would!” she exclaimed, trying not to make her voice seem too eager.

“You might have a play party with them,” Billy went on.  If Miss Pompret could have heard him then I feel sure she would have fainted, or had what Dinah would call “a cat in a fit.”

“You want those dishes?” asked the old man, as he reached over and lifted the sugar bowl and pitcher from his window.  “Ach! them is a great bargain.  I let you have them cheap.  And see, not a chip or a crack on ’em.  Good china, too!  Very valuable, but they is all I have left.  I sells ’em cheap.”

Bert took the sugar bowl and looked closely at it, while Nan took the pitcher.  The children felt sure these were the same pieces that would fill out Miss Pompret’s set.

“Look at the mark on the bottom,” whispered Nan to Bert, as the storekeeper hurried to the other side of the room to rescue a pile of chairs which Freddie seemed bent on pulling down.  “Is the blue lion there?”

“Yes,” answered Bert, “it is.”

“And the letters ’J.  W.’?”

“Yes,” Bert replied.  “But, somehow, it doesn’t look like the one on Miss Pompret’s plates.”

“Oh, I’m sure it’s the same one!” insisted Nan.  “We’ve found the missing pieces, Bert, and we’ll get—­”