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And so saying, Tiny began to descend from his attic. Carefully he went down the stairs, ready to ask help of the first person whose voice he should hear. But he had groped his way as far as the street door, before he met a soul. As he stepped upon the threshold, and was about to move on into the street, a voice–a child’s voice–said to him–

“I’m very hungry, sir.”

The patient tone of the speaker arrested Tiny’s steps, and he pondered a moment. It was the hearts that belonged to voices like this, which he had vowed to help! His own heart sunk within him at that thought. “Wretched soul that I am,” said he to himself, thinking of the opportunities which he had lost. But to the child he said–

“I’m blinder than a bat, and hungry, too. So I’m worse off than you are. Do you live about here?”

“Just round the corner,” said the little girl.

“Is there a physician near here?” he asked next; for a now thought–a new hope, rather–had come into his heart.

“Yes, sir–very near. I know where it is,” said the child. “I got him once for my mother.”

“If you will lead me to him,” said Tiny, his voice broken as his heart was, “I will do a good turn for you. You won’t be the loser by it. Who takes care of you?”

“Of me, sir?” asked the girl, as if surprised that he should think that any one took care of her. “Nobody. I’m all alone.”

“Alone! alone!” repeated Tiny: “your hand is very little; you are a mite of a girl to be alone.”

“They’re all dead but me, every one of ’em. Yes, sir, they are.”

“No mother?” said Tiny, with a choking voice–thinking of the kind heart and tender loving eyes away off in the lonely little cottage on the border of the forest–“no mother, little girl? Was that what you said?”

“Dead,” replied the child.

“Did you love her?” asked Tiny, the poet, while his heart wept burning tears.

The girl said not a word, but Tiny heard her sob, and held her hand close in his own, as though he would protect her, even if he were blind, while he said aloud–

“Lead me to the physician, little friend.”

Quietly and swiftly she led him, and as they went, Tiny never once thought, What if any of the great folks who once courted and praised him should see him led on foot through the streets by a little beggar girl, himself looking hardly more respectable than the poorest of all beggars!

“Shall I ring the door bell?” asked she, at length coming to a sudden halt.

“King it,” said he.

But before she could do that the house door opened, and the physician himself appeared, prepared for a drive; his carriage was already in waiting at the door.

“Here he is,” exclaimed the girl; and at the same moment a gruff voice demanded–

“What do you want, you two, eh? Speak quick, for I’m off.”

In one word Tiny told what it was he wanted.

“Blind, eh?” said the doctor, stooping and looking into the pale face of the unhappy singer; “born blind! I can do nothing for you. John! drive the horses away from that curb-stone.”

He stepped forward, as he spoke, as if about to leave the children, but he stood still again the next minute, arrested by the sound of Tiny’s indignant voice.

“Born blind!” the singer cried; “no more than you were, sir. If you knew how to use your eyes to any good purpose, you never would say such a thing. Since I was ill I’ve been blind, but never a moment before.”

“Come into the house a minute,” said the doctor, who had been carefully studying Tiny’s face during the last few seconds. “Come in, and I’ll soon settle that point for you.”