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diff --git a/64891-0.txt b/64891-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..5e41667 --- /dev/null +++ b/64891-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,3910 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook of A Pair of Them, by Evelyn Raymond + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and +most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions +whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms +of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at +www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will +have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using +this eBook. + +Title: A Pair of Them + +Author: Evelyn Raymond + +Release Date: March 20, 2021 [eBook #64891] + +Language: English + +Produced by: D A Alexander, David E. Brown, and the Online Distributed + Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced + from images generously made available by the Library of Congress) + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A PAIR OF THEM *** + + + + +A Pair of Them + + + + +SUNSHINE LIBRARY. + + + =Aunt Hannah and Seth.= By James Otis. + =Blind Brother= (=The=). By Homer Greene. + =Captain’s Dog= (=The=). By Louis Énault. + =Cat and the Candle= (=The=). By Mary F. Leonard. + =Christmas at Deacon Hackett’s.= By James Otis. + =Christmas-Tree Scholar.= By Frances Bent Dillingham. + =Dear Little Marchioness.= The Story of a Child’s Faith and Love. + =Dick in the Desert.= By James Otis. + =Divided Skates.= By Evelyn Raymond. + =Gold Thread= (=The=). By Norman MacLeod, D.D. + =Half a Dozen Thinking Caps.= By Mary Leonard. + =How Tommy Saved the Barn.= By James Otis. + =Ingleside.= By Barbara Yechton. + =J. Cole.= By Emma Gellibrand. + =Jessica’s First Prayer.= By Hesba Stretton. + =Laddie.= By the author of “Miss Toosey’s Mission.” + =Little Crusaders.= By Eva Madden. + =Little Sunshine’s Holiday.= By Miss Mulock. + =Little Peter.= By Lucas Malet. + =Master Sunshine.= By Mrs. C. F. Fraser. + =Miss Toosey’s Mission.= By the author of “Laddie.” + =Musical Journey of Dorothy and Delia.= By Bradley Gilman. + =Our Uncle, the Major.= A Story of 1765. By James Otis. + =Pair of Them= (=A=). By Evelyn Raymond. + =Playground Toni.= By Anna Chapin Ray. + =Play Lady= (=The=). By Ella Farman Pratt. + =Prince Prigio.= By Andrew Lang. + =Short Cruise= (=A=). By James Otis. + =Smoky Days.= By Edward W. Thomson. + =Strawberry Hill.= By Mrs. C. F. Fraser. + =Sunbeams and Moonbeams.= By Louise R. Baker. + =Two and One.= By Charlotte M. Vaile. + =Wreck of the Circus= (=The=). By James Otis. + =Young Boss= (=The=). By Edward W. Thomson. + + +THOMAS Y. CROWELL & COMPANY, NEW YORK. + + +[Illustration: “WHY, YES, BONNY-GAY! I’VE COME.” See page 77.] + + + + + [Illustration] + + A PAIR OF THEM + + BY EVELYN RAYMOND + + [Illustration] + + + NEW YORK. + Thomas Y. Crowell & Co. + Publishers. + + + + + COPYRIGHT, 1901, + BY THOMAS Y. CROWELL & CO. + + + + +CONTENTS + + + CHAPTER PAGE + + I. Where the Houses are Big 1 + + II. Where the Houses are Small 15 + + III. How the Pair Met 29 + + IV. Max Reappears 44 + + V. Mary Jane Goes Visiting 59 + + VI. The Flight and Fright of Mary Jane 78 + + VII. On the Way Home 95 + + VIII. Confidences 112 + + IX. By the Strength of Love 132 + + Afterward 150 + + + + +A PAIR OF THEM + + + + +CHAPTER I + +WHERE THE HOUSES ARE BIG + + +“It’s a queer kind of a name, though it suits you,” observed the Gray +Gentleman, thoughtfully. “How came you by it?” + +Bonny-Gay flashed the questioner a smile, hugged Max closer and replied: + +“I was born on a Sunday morning. That’s how.” + +“Ah, indeed? But I don’t quite understand.” + +“Don’t you? Seems easy. Let’s sit down here by ‘Father George’ and I’ll +explain. If I can.” + +The Gray Gentleman was very tall and dignified, yet he had a habit of +doing whatever Bonny-Gay asked him. So he now doubled himself up and +perched on the low curb surrounding the monument, while the little +girl and the big black dog dropped easily down beside him. Then he +leaned his head back against the iron railing and gazed reflectively +into the face of the big bronze lion, just opposite. + +Both the child and the man were fond of the wonderful lion, which +seemed a mighty guardian of the beautiful Place, and he, at least, knew +it to be a world-famous work of art. Bonny-Gay loved it as she loved +all animals, alive or sculptured, and with much the same devotion she +gave to Max. The park without either of these four-footed creatures +would have seemed strange indeed to her, for they were her earliest +playmates and remained still her dearest. + +“Now you can tell me,” again suggested the Gray Gentleman. + +“It was Easter, too. All the people were going to the churches, the +bells were ringing, the organs playing, and everything just beautiful. +Nurse Nance began it, my mother says. ‘For the child that is born on +the Sabbath Day is lucky, and bonny, and wise, and gay.’ But my father +says there isn’t any ‘luck’ and a child like me isn’t ‘wise,’ so they +had to leave them out and I’m only Bonny-Gay. That’s all.” + +“A very satisfactory explanation,” said the Gray Gentleman, with one of +his rare smiles, and laying his hand kindly upon the golden curls. “And +now, my dear, one question more. In which of these beautiful houses do +you live?” + +As he spoke, the stranger’s glance wandered all about that aristocratic +neighborhood of Mt. Vernon Place, to which he had returned after many +years of absence to make his own home. Since he had gone away all +the small people whom he used to know and love had grown up, and he +had felt quite lost and lonely, even in that familiar scene, till he +had chanced to meet Bonny-Gay, just one week before. Since then, and +her ready adoption of himself as a comrade, he had had no time for +loneliness. She was always out in the charming Square, as much a part +of it as the Washington monument, which the little folks called “Father +George,” or the bronzes, and the smooth lawns. She seemed as bright as +the sunshine and almost as well-beloved, for the other children flocked +about her, the keeper consulted her and the keeper’s dog followed her +like a shadow. + +With a toss of her yellow locks she pointed her forefinger westward. + +“There, in that corner one, all covered by vines, with places for the +windows cut out, and the chimneys all green, and I think it’s the +prettiest one in the whole place, when it has its summer clothes on. +Don’t you?” + +The Gray Gentleman’s glance followed the direction of the pointing +finger. + +“Yes. It is a very lovely home and a very big one. I hope you are not +the only child who lives in it.” + +“But I am. Why?” + +“Why what?” + +“Do you hope it?” + +“You would be lonely, I should think.” + +“Lonely? I? Why--why--I just never have a single minute to myself. +There’s my thirteen dolls, and the parrot, and the two canaries, and +the aquarium, and my pony, and--Oh! dear! you can’t guess. That’s why I +have to come out here--to rest myself.” + +“Ah, so! Well, I should judge that you spend the most of your time in +‘resting,’” commented the other. “Whenever I come out you’re always +here.” + +Bonny-Gay laughed; so merrily that Max lifted his head and licked her +cheek. That reminded her of something and she asked: + +“Have you seen him get his second dinner?” + +“Not even his first!” + +“You haven’t? How odd!” Bonny-Gay shook out her skirts and proceeded +to enlighten her comrade’s ignorance. She took it for granted, or she +had done so, that he knew as much about things as she herself; but if +not, why, there was a deal to tell. Max’s history first. She began by +declaring: + +“He’s the smartest dog in the world. Everybody knows that. He’s lived +in the Place nine years. That’s one year longer than I have. All the +children’s big brothers and sisters have played with him, same’s we do +now. He never lets a tramp come near. He never steps on a flower bed or +lets us. If we forget and go on the grass he barks us off. He gets his +first dinner at our house. When the clocks strike twelve he goes to the +gardener and gets his basket. Then he walks to our back entrance, puts +the basket down, stands up on his hind feet and pushes his nose against +the ’lectric bell. That rings up the cook and--she’s a man just +now--he--she takes the basket and puts in some food. Then Max walks +down that side street, about a square, and sits on the curb to eat it. +‘Just like a beggar,’ the gardener says, ‘’cause he likes to feed his +own dog his own self.’ I would, too, wouldn’t you?” + +“If I owned the ‘smartest dog in the whole world’ I presume I should.” + +“Max feels ashamed of it, too; don’t you, dear?” + +The dog replied by dropping his black head from Bonny-Gay’s shoulder +to the ground and by blinking in a deprecating way from that lowly +position. + +“Then, in a few minutes, he comes back to the gardener with the empty +basket and stands and wags his tail as if he were the hungriest dog +that ever was. Then the keeper says: ‘Yes. You may go, Max!’ And off he +trots, away down the other way, to some place where his master lives +and gets a second basket full. That he brings back here, and the man +puts a paper on the ground under the bushes and he eats again. Just +like folks to their own table, that time; don’t you, Max Doggie, smart +doggie!” + +The handsome animal shook his wavy fleece and sprang up, ready for a +frolic and evidently aware that he had been the subject of discussion. + +“No, not yet, sir. The best thing hasn’t been told. Listen, please, +Mr.----” + +The stranger waited a moment, then inquired: + +“Mr. what, Bonny-Gay? I wonder if you know my name.” + +“Not your truly one, but that doesn’t matter.” + +“What do you happen to call me, if you ever speak of me when I’m not +here?” + +The little girl hesitated an instant, then frankly answered: + +“Why, just the ‘Gray Gentleman.’ ’Cause you are all gray, you see. Your +hair, and your moustache, and your eyes, and your clothes, and your +hat, and your gloves, and--and--things.” + +“Exactly. Trust a child to find an appropriate nickname. But I like it, +little one. Go on, about Max and the best thing yet.” + +“That splendid dog has--saved--his--master’s life! As true as true!” +cried Bonny-Gay, impressively. + +“Indeed! Wonderful! How was it?” + +“It was pay-day night and Mr. Weems, that’s his name, had a lot of +money. And some bad men knew it. And they came, do you believe, right +in the middle of that night, and broke a window in Mr. Weems’s house; +and Max heard them and flew--and flew--” + +The Gray Gentleman stooped and searched for the dog’s wings. + +“Well, ran, then,” laughed Bonny-Gay, “and he drove them all off and +they had revolvers or something and one was shot and a policeman caught +him and Max was shot and the gardener would have been killed--” + +“Only he wasn’t,” interrupted somebody, coming from behind them. + +So the child paused in her breathless description of a scene she had +often pictured to herself and looked up into the face of the hero of +the affair, himself. + +“Why, Mr. Weems! you almost frightened me! and you please tell the +rest.” + +But though the gardener smiled upon her he nodded his head gravely. + +“Guess it won’t do for me to think about that just now, or any other +of our good times, old Max! Good fellow, fine fellow! Poor old doggie! +It’s going to be as hard on you as on me, I’m afraid.” + +By this time Bonny-Gay saw that something was amiss. She half fancied +that there were tears in the keeper’s eyes, and she always afterward +declared that there were tears in his voice. As for Max, that sagacious +animal sank suddenly upon his haunches, looked sternly into his +master’s face, and demanded by his earnest, startled expression to know +what was wrong. Something was. He knew that, even more positively than +did Bonny-Gay. + +“It’s an outrageous law. There ought to be exceptions to it. All +dogs--Well, there’s no other dog like Max. Ah! hum. Old doggie!” + +The Gray Gentleman was tempted to ask questions, but the little girl +was sure to do that; so he waited. In a few minutes she had gotten the +whole sad story from her old friend, the gardener, and her sunny head +had gone down upon the dog’s black one in a paroxysm of grief. + +A moment later it was lifted defiantly. + +“But he shan’t. He shall not! Nobody shall ever, ever take our Max +away! Why--why--it wouldn’t be the Place without him! Why--why--the +children--Oh! Nettie! oh! Tom!” and catching sight of a group of +playmates Bonny-Gay darted toward them, calling as she ran: “They’re +going to take him away! They’re going to take him away!” + +Tom planted his feet wide apart upon the smooth path and obstructed her +advance. + +“Take who away, Bonny-Gay? Where to? When?” + +“Max! Our Max! He can never come here any more. This is his last day in +our park--his very last!” and the child flung herself headlong upon the +shaven grass, for once regardless of rules. + +Not so regardless was Max, the trusty. It didn’t matter to him that +this was Bonny-Gay, his best-loved playmate, or that her frantic +sorrow was all on his account. What he saw was his duty and he did it, +instantly. From a distance the Gray Gentleman watched the dog race +toward the prostrate little girl and shake her short skirts vigorously, +loosing them now and then to bark at her with equal vigor. + +Presently she sprang up and to the footpath, and again indulged in a +wild embrace of the faithful canine. Indeed, he was at once the center +of an ever-increasing company of small people, who seemed to vie with +each other in attempts to hug his breath away and to outdo everybody in +the way of fierce indignation. Finally, this assembly resolved itself +into an advancing army, and with Tom and Bonny-Gay as leaders--each +tightly holding to one of the dog’s soft ears, as they marched him +between them--they returned to the spot where the lion calmly awaited +them, and Tom announced their decision: + +“We won’t ever let him go. There’s no need for you nor the law-men +nor nobody to interfere. This dog belongs to this park; and this +park belongs to us children; and if anybody tries to--tries +to--to--do--things--he won’t never be let! So there! And if he is, +we’ll--we’ll augernize; and we’ll get every boy and girl in all the +streets around to come, too; and we’ll all go march to where the +law-men live; and we won’t never, never leave go talking at them till +they take it all back. ’Cause Max isn’t going to be took. That’s the +fact, Mr. Weems, and you can just tell them so.” + +“Yes,” cried Nettie, “and my big brother goes to the law school and +he’ll suesan them. And my big sister’s friends will help; and if he +does have to, I’ll never, never--NEVER--play in this hateful old park +ever again. I will not!” + +“Whew!” whistled the Gray Gentleman, softly. “This looks serious. A +children’s crusade, indeed. Well, that should be irresistible.” And +this old lover of all little people looked admiringly over the group of +flushed and indignant faces; and at the noble animal which was the very +center of it, and whose silent protest was the most eloquent of all. +His own heart echoed their indignation and he quietly resolved to make +an effort on their and Max’s behalf. + +But the dire, unspoken threats of the children, and the silent +resolution of the Gray Gentleman, were useless. For when upon the next +morning the sun rose over the pleasant Place, and the monument and the +lion began to cast their shadows earthward, there was no Max to gambol +at their feet, and over the heart of Bonny-Gay had fallen her first +real grief. + +She was out early, to see if the dreadful thing were true; and the Gray +Gentleman met her and scarcely knew her--without the smiles. + +When he did recognize her he said, hopefully: + +“We’ll trust it’s all for the best, my dear. Besides, you will now have +more time for the thirteen dolls, and the parrot, and the two canaries, +and--” + +“But they--they aren’t Max! He was the only! We loved him so and now +he’ll just be wasted on strangers! Oh! it’s too bad, too bad!” + +The Gray Gentleman clasped the little hand in sympathy. + +“I am very sorry for your sorrow, Bonny-Gay, and yet I can’t believe +that Max is ‘wasted.’ No good thing ever is. Besides that, I have a +plan in my head. With your parents’ permission, I am going to take you +this day to visit your twin sister.” + +“My--twin--sister! Why there isn’t any. Don’t you remember? I told you. +I’m the only, only one. There never was any other.” + +“Nevertheless, I am obliged to contradict you. Very rude, I know, and +I shouldn’t do so, if I were not so positive of what I claim. I hope +you’ll love her and I think you will. After breakfast I’ll see you +again. Good morning.” + +With that he walked briskly away and Bonny-Gay saw him enter the big +gray house in the middle of the Place. The house where the wooden +shutters had always been up, ever since she could remember, until just +this spring, when a few of the windows had been uncovered to let the +sunlight in. + +“My--twin--sister! How queer that is!” mused the watching child. + + + + +CHAPTER II + +WHERE THE HOUSES ARE SMALL + + +Mary Jane dropped her crutches on the floor and readjusted the baby. He +had a most trying habit of not staying “put,” and sometimes the other +children slapped him. Mary Jane never did that. She merely set him up +again, gave his cheek a pat or a kiss, and went on about her business. + +For, indeed, she was almost the very busiest small body in the world. +Besides her own mother’s five other children there were the neighbors’ +broods, big and little, with never a soul to mind them save their +self-constituted nurse. + +That very morning Mrs. Bump had paused in her washing to look up and +exclaim: + +“I never did see how the little things do take to her! She can do just +wonders with them, that she can; and I reckon it was about the best +thing ever happened to her, that falling out the top window, like she +did. Seemed to knock all the selfishness out of her. Maybe it’s _that_ +settled in her poor body. Yes, maybe it’s that, dear heart. Anyhow, her +inside’s all right. The rightest there ever was. If this world was just +full of Mary Janes, what a grand place it would be!” + +Then, after a regretful sigh for this beatific state of things, the +mother thrust her strong arms again into the suds, with a splash and a +rub-a-dub-dub which told plainly enough from whom Mary Jane inherited +her energy. + +Just then Mrs. Stebbins thrust her head out of the window, next door, +to remark: + +“There was fifty-four of them gardens given out. My boy’s goin’ to +raise cabbages.” + +“You don’t say! Now, ain’t that fine? I wish I had a son to get one, +but all my boys is girls, save the baby, and he don’t count. Though +he’ll grow, won’t he, mother’s lamb? He’ll grow just as fast as he +can and get a playground garden, good’s the next one, so he will, the +precious!” chirruped Mrs. Bump, to the year-old heir of the house. + +“Gah, gah!” cooed the baby; and emphasized his reply by losing his +balance against the wall and rolling over on his face. He was too fat +and too phlegmatic to right himself, so Mary Jane hopped back across +the narrow room and set him up again, laughing as if this were the +funniest thing she had ever seen. + +“Pshaw, daughter! If I was you and you was me, I’d leave him lie that +way a spell. He don’t ’pear to have the sense the rest of you had, no +he don’t, the sweet! Maybe that’s because he’s a boy. But even a boy +might learn something after a while, if he was let. Only you’re so +right on hand all the time he expects you to just about breathe for +him, seems.” + +“Now, mother, now! And you know he’s the biggest, roundest--” + +“Pudding-headedest!” growled a masculine voice, at the narrow doorway. + +Mrs. Bump wheeled round so sharply that her rubbing-board fell out of +the tub and scared the baby, who promptly began to scream. + +“Why father! You home? It can’t be dinner-time, yet. What’s happened? +Anything wrong?” + +“Is anything ever right?” demanded the man, sulkily. + +“Plenty of things,” answered the wife, cheerfully, though her heart +sank. + +“One of the right things is my getting kicked out, I s’pose.” + +“Father! you don’t mean it! No.” + +“I’m not much of a joker, am I?” + +“No. That you’re not. But tell me, man.” + +With a quiver in the usually cheerful voice, Mrs. Bump wiped the suds +from her arms and went to her husband. Laying her hand kindly upon +his shoulder she demanded, as was her right, to know the facts of the +disaster that had befallen them. + +“’Twon’t take long to tell, woman. The company’s cuttin’ down expenses +and I was one of the expenses lopped off. That’s all.” + +“Is that all--_all_, William Bump?” + +The question was sternly put and the man cowered before it. + +“It’s the truth, any way. No matter how it happened, here I am and no +work.” With that he dropped his arms upon the window sill and his face +upon his arms, and lapsed into a sullen silence. + +Mrs. Bump caught her breath, whisked away a tear that had crept into +her eye, and returned to her tub. Mary Jane ceased staring at her +parents, tipped the baby’s home-made go-cart on end, rolled him into +it, righted the awkward vehicle, threw its leather strap over her +shoulders, called to the children: “Come!” and hopped away upon her +crutches. + +Though she paused, for just one second, beside her father and imprinted +a hasty kiss upon the back of his bent head. A kiss so light it seemed +he could scarcely have felt it, though it was quite sufficient to +thrill the man’s soul with an added sense of regret and degradation. + +“We’re off to the park, mother, and I’ve taken a loaf with me!” she +called backward, as she clicked out of sight. + +Again the woman idled for a moment, looking through the open doorway +toward the small, misshapen figure of her eldest child as it swung +swiftly forward upon its “wooden feet.” The baby’s soap-box wagon +rattled and bumped along behind, bouncing his plump body about, and +drawn by Mary Jane in the only manner possible to her--with a strap +across her chest. She needed both her hands just then to support +herself upon her crutches; for her lower limbs were useless and swung +heavily between these crutches--a leaden weight from which she never +could be free. + +Even so, there were few who could travel as rapidly as Mary Jane and +this morning she was especially eager to get on. Because down at the +pretty park upon which her own dingy street terminated, the children’s +“Playgrounds” had been opened for the summer and the small gardens +given out. She was anxious to see the planting and seed-sowing, by the +tiny farmers of this free kindergarten, and down in her heart was a +faint hope that even to her, a girl, might a bit of land be assigned; +where she, too, could raise some of the wonderful vegetables which +would be her very own when the autumn came and the small crops were +harvested. + +The hope was so deep and so intense, that she had to stop, turn about, +shake up the baby and tell him about it. + +“You see, Baby Bump, they don’t give ’em out to just girls. Only I’m +not a regular plain kind of girl, I’m a crippley sort. That might make +a difference. Though there’s Hattie Moran, she’s lame, too. Not very +lame, Baby, only a little lame. She doesn’t have to have crutches, she +just goes hoppety-pat, hoppety-pat, easy like. Sophia Guttmacher, +she’s a hunchback, same’s me, course, but she can walk. Besides that +she doesn’t want a garden and I do. As for Ernest Knabe, his foot’s +just twisted and that’s all. Then, too, he’s a boy. He could have one +if he wanted. He’d have to dig one, I guess, if it wasn’t for his foot. +Oh! Baby dear. Do you s’pose I might--I might, maybe, get one?” + +“Goo, goo,” murmured the infant, encouragingly, and vainly trying to +bring his own foot within reach of his mouth. + +“Oh! you sweet! You can’t do that, you know. You’re far too fat. And I +declare, all the other children have gone on while I’ve stood here just +talking to you. That won’t do, sir, much as I love you. Sit up, now, +there’s sister’s little man, and I’ll hurry up.” + +But just then, Baby made a final, desperate effort to taste his toes, +lost his balance, and rolled forward out of his box, as a ball might +have done. + +Mary Jane, burst into a peal of laughter which recalled the other +children to the spot and she explained between breaths: + +“The cute little fellow was trying to make ‘huckleberry-bread’; I do +believe he was, the darling! Well, he’s so round it doesn’t matter +which way he tumbles, and he’s so soft nothing ever hurts him. Does it, +precious?” + +They all lent a hand in setting the infant right again. Several holding +the soap-box level, a couple supporting Mary Jane without her crutches +which left her arms free to lift and replace the dislodged baby. When +things were once more in order the caravan started onward afresh. + +By this time the small, dingy houses bordering the narrow unpaved +street had given place to open lots and weedy patches, where the sun +lay warmly and a fresh breeze blew. To the right of the open space was +a railway embankment, and on the left there was the cling-clanging of +a mighty steel structure, in process of building. The railway and the +monster “sheds” belonged to the same company for which William Bump had +toiled--when he felt inclined--and by which he had just been discharged. + +Mary Jane had been accustomed to look for him, either along the rails, +with the gang that seemed always to be replacing old “ties” by new +ones; or else serving the skilled workmen, who hammered, hammered, all +day long upon the great metal girders. As she now caught the echo of +these strokes a pang shot through her loving heart and for a moment her +sunny face clouded. She need look no more, to either right or left, for +the blue-shirted figure, which had been wont to wave a salutation to +her as she passed with her brood of nurselings. + +Fortunately, the baby was on hand to banish the cloud, which he +promptly did in his accustomed manner--with a slight variation. For +his small charioteer had not observed a big stone in the path, though +the loose ricketty wheel of the wagon found and struck it squarely. +This raised the soap-box in front and its occupant performed a backward +somersault. + +“Oh! my sake! Mary Jane--Mary Jane!” shrieked several small voices in +wild reproach. + +Mary Jane picked up the little one, who smiled, unhurt; and the others +helped her shake him back to a normal condition and pose. After which, +the park lying just before them, between the railway and the buildings, +they scurried into it, and over the slope, and around to a sunny spot +where scores of other little people were hard at work or play. + +“Hi! Mary Jane! Oh, Mary Jane!” shouted one and another; and the +kind-faced “teachers” who guided the wee ones, also nodded their +friendly welcome. For well they knew that there was no “assistant” +in the whole city who could be as useful to them as this same humble +little girl from Dingy street. + +“Thirteen, Mary Jane! I’m thirteen! Come see. Cucumbers!” cried +Bobby Saunders, dragging her forward so eagerly that the soap-box +strap slipped up across her throat and choked her. But she quickly +released herself now from her burden, certain that in the midst of so +many friends no harm could befall her darling; and once freed from +this incubus, she outstripped Bobby in reaching the long rows of +well-prepared garden plots, wherein as yet was never a sign of any +growing thing. + +But oh! how soft and rich and brown the earth did look! How sweet +the fragrance of it in Mary Jane’s nature-loving nostrils! And how, +for once, she longed to be a boy! As straight-limbed, as strong, +as unhindered at her toil, as any of these happy little lads who +clustered about, each interrupting his neighbor in his eagerness for +her sympathy and interest. + +“Fifty-one, Mary Jane!” cried Joe Stebbins, pointing proudly to the +numbered stick at the foot of his plot. “Cabbages--cabbages! The +gardener’s bringing a box of plants this minute. I’ll give you one to +bile when they get growed. Like that?” + +“Prime!” answered the girl, her own face aglow. + +“But I’m limas, Mary Jane. I’m Seven. Away over here. I’ve sowed ’em +and to-morrer I’ll hoe ’em, I guess.” + +“And I guess I wouldn’t till they sprout,” laughed she hopping along, +at perilous speed, to inspect number seven. + +“Don’t go so fast, Mary Jane! I can’t keep up with you. See. I’m right +up front--number Three. I’m tomatuses, I am. Like ’em?” demanded Ned +Smith, a seven-year-old farmer. + +“I’m potatoes. They’re the best for your money,” observed Jimmy +O’Brien. “We’ll roast some in the ashes, bime-by. Does the baby like +’tatoes?” + +“Don’t he? You just ought to see him eat them--when we have them,” she +added, cautiously. + +“Oh! you’ll have ’em, plenty. When I dig my crop. Why, I s’pose +there’ll be enough in my ‘farm’ to keep your folks and mine all winter; +and I might have some to sell on the street,” observed Jimmy, casting a +speculative glance upon the diminutive plot of ground over which he was +now master. + +“Might you; ain’t that splendid!” commented Mary Jane, delightedly. +“Why, if you could give us all our potatoes, mother could easy wash for +the rent and the bread and things. My sake! I ’most forgot the baby. +Where’s he at? Can you see him?” + +“He’s right in the middle of the sand-heap and the teacher has give +him a little shovel. Say, what you bring him for? this ain’t no +day-nursery, this ain’t. It’s a playground farm and one-year-olds don’t +belong.” + +“Maybe they don’t, but the baby belongs. That is if I do,” said the +sister stoutly; “maybe you’ll say next I don’t.” + +“No, I shan’t say that. Why, what could we do without you? And say, +Mary Jane.” + +“Well, say it quick. The girls are calling me to swing on the Maypole. +’Cause that’s one thing I can do without my crutches.” + +“Well, in a minute. But, say. Sometimes I used to let you hoe in my +garden, last summer. Remember?” + +“Course. I helped you a lot.” + +“Don’t know about that. But you might this year. That is, maybe. If we +went partners, you see; and if the teacher didn’t get on to it; and if +there was a medal give and you let me have it, ’cause I’m the one has +the farm, course. What you say?” + +“I say we couldn’t do such a thing without the teacher knowing and I +wouldn’t if we could. And you’ll never get a medal, you’re too lazy. +But you’re real gen’rous, too, and I’ll be so glad to help. Oh! I love +it! I just feel’s if I could put my face right down on that crumbly +ground and go to sleep. It’s so dear.” + +“Huh! If you did I s’pose you’d get earwigs in your ears and--and +angleworms, and--things. Maybe snakes. But I’ll let you,” concluded +Jimmy, graciously. + +Then they turned around and there was--what seemed to the beholders, a +veritable small angel! + +Mary Jane was so startled she dropped her crutches and, for an instant, +quite forgot all about the baby. The apparition was clothed in white, +so soft and fine and transparent that it seemed to enwrap her as a +cloud; and above the cloud rose a face so lovely and so winning that it +made Mary Jane’s heart almost stand still in ecstasy. + + + + +CHAPTER III + +HOW THE PAIR MET + + +But when things cleared a little, it was only Bonny-Gay! and the Gray +Gentleman was supporting Mary Jane without her crutches--though she +didn’t realize that, at first. Afterward she was able to look up into +his face and smile a welcome, because he and she were already quite +close friends. + +What had happened was this: the Gray Gentleman had sent his elderly +black “boy” with a note to the vine-covered house in Mt. Vernon Place +and had requested “the favor of Miss Beulah’s company upon a drive, +that morning. He intended to visit one of the ‘Playgrounds’ in the +south-western part of the city, and he felt that the little girl whose +society he so greatly enjoyed would find much to interest her, if she +might be with him.” + +To this he had signed a name which was quite powerful enough to secure +Mrs. McClure’s instant and delighted assent; and she had at once +returned a very graceful note of acceptance by the “boy.” + +Then at ten o’clock precisely, the Gray Gentleman’s carriage had +gone around for “Miss McClure,” and she had been lifted into it and +to a seat beside her friend. A half-hour’s drive followed; through +streets and avenues which Bonny-Gay had never seen before, and which +continually grew narrower and more crowded. Even the houses seemed to +shrink in size, and the little girl had finally exclaimed: + +“Why, it’s like the buildings were so little that they just squeeze the +folks out of them, upon the steps and through the windows. I never, +never saw! Will they get to be just playhouses, by-and-by?” + +“No, Bonny-Gay, I’m sure you never did. Yet it’s the same city in which +is your own big home, and they are just the same sort of human beings +as you and I.” + +“Are they? It doesn’t--doesn’t just seem so, does it? And why do they +all stare at us like that?” + +“Because we do at them, maybe; and it’s not a common thing to see +carriages with liveried attendants pass this way. I suppose you, in +your dainty clothes, are as much a ‘show’ to them as they to you in +their coarse attire, or rags.” + +Bonny-Gay looked thoughtfully at her frock. She would have preferred to +wear a simpler one; and a comfortable “Tam” instead of the feathered +hat which adorned her sunny head. But her mother had decided otherwise; +since the Gray Gentleman had done her the honor of that morning it was +but courtesy to show appreciation of it by a good appearance. + +After a moment she looked up and observed: + +“It’s the queerest thing! I feel as if I ought to get out and walk; and +as if I should give this hat to that little girl who hasn’t any.” + +The Gray Gentleman smiled. + +“That would be going to the other extreme, my dear, and would help +neither you nor them. Besides, this is not all we came to see, and here +we are!” + +Then the street had suddenly ended and the carriage had turned in at +a big gate, to roll almost silently onward till it stopped before a +“Mansion,” with ancient wooden shutters and a clematis-draped porch. +This was natural and quite suggestive to Bonny-Gay of her own beloved +Druid Hill, wherein she was accustomed to take her stately drives in +her father’s own carriage; and when she heard the shouts and laughter +of children from the tree-hidden “Playgrounds,” her spirits rose to the +normal again and she laughed in return. + +Dancing along beside him, with her hand in his, she had demanded +eagerly: + +“Is it here I am to see my ‘twin sister?’ Oh! I want to find +her--quick, quick!” + +“Yes, it is here, and this is--she;” answered her guide, as they paused +behind Jimmy and Mary Jane, toward whom he silently nodded. + +This was how the pair met; and while Mary Jane saw what she fancied was +an “angel” that which Bonny-Gay saw was a girl of her own age, with +short, limp legs, very long arms, and a crooked back. But the dark head +above the poor humped shoulders was as shapely as the “angel’s” own; +the dark eyes as beautiful as the blue ones; and from the wide, merry +mouth flashed a smile quite as radiant and winning. + +As soon as she saw the smile Bonny-Gay began to understand what the +Gray Gentleman had meant, and she telegraphed him a glance that said +she did. Then she laughed and held out her two hands to Mary Jane. + +“I guess you’re the girl I’ve come to see: my ‘twin sister!’ How-de-do?” + +“How-de-do?” echoed Mary Jane, too astonished to say more. + +The Gray Gentleman quietly slipped her crutches under the cripple’s +arms, and seizing Jimmy’s hand walked swiftly away. + +Both girls looked after him with regret but he neither glanced back nor +expected them to follow. Then they regarded each other with curiosity, +till Mary Jane remembered she was the hostess. + +“Let’s sit down,” she said pointing to the grass. + +Bonny-Gay hesitated, and, seeing this, the other whisked off her apron +and spread it for her guest. “You might spoil your dress, that’s so. +Salt and lemon juice’ll take out grass-stain. My mother uses that when +there’s spots on the ‘wash.’” + +“Does she? I wasn’t thinking of my frock, though, but of _that_;” +answered the visitor, pointing to a “Keep Off” sign behind them. + +“Oh! that? Nobody minds that. You see, this is _our_ park now. We play +where we choose, only on the terraces and slopey places. You’d better +use my apron though, it’s such a splendid dress. Your mother would feel +bad if you smirched it.” + +“I suppose she would. She’s very particular.” + +“So’s mine. They say she’s the very neatest woman in Dingy street. The +neighbors say it.” + +“And our cook says mine is the ‘fussiest’ one in the Place. That might +be some of the ‘sister’ part, mightn’t it?” + +“It might. Only, course, he’s just fooling.” + +“I don’t believe the Gray Gentleman ever fools. He means things. He’s +made us children think a lot. More’n we ever did before. And he says +things mean things, too, every single one. Even ‘Father George,’ and +the lion, and Max, and--and everything.” + +After this exhausting speech Bonny-Gay removed her hat and laid it upon +the grass, where Mary Jane regarded it admiringly. It was so pretty +she would have liked to touch it, just once. The hat’s owner saw the +admiration, and remarked: + +“Put it on, Mary Jane. See if it will fit you.” + +“Oh! I daren’t!” gasped the other. “I might hurt it.” + +Bonny-Gay lifted the hat and placed it upon the cripple’s dark head, +which was held perfectly motionless, while the face beneath the brim +took on an expression of bewildered happiness. + +“My! ain’t it lovely! I should think you’d want to wear it all the +time!” + +“I don’t, then. I like my ‘Tam’ better, and nothing best of all. You +can wear it as long as I stay, if you wish.” + +“That’s good of you. Some of the other girls wouldn’t even let me touch +their best hats, they wouldn’t.” + +“Must be selfish things, then. How old are you, Mary Jane?” + +“How’d you know my name? and what’s yours?” + +Bonny-Gay stated it and explained: + +“I heard that Jimmy boy call you. How old did you say?” + +“I didn’t say, but I’m eight, going on nine.” + +“Why, so am I. I’m a ‘Sunday’s bairn’.” + +“And I!” cried Mary Jane, breathlessly. + +After that confidences were swift; and, presently, each little girl +knew all about the other; till, in one pause for breath, the cripple +suddenly remembered the baby. Then she caught up her crutches, swung +herself upon them, and started off in pursuit of him. + +Bonny-Gay watched her disappear in the midst of the crowd of children, +who had all shyly held aloof from herself, saw how they clung about her +and how some of the tiniest ones held up their faces to be kissed. She +saw her stoop to tie the ragged shoe of one and button the frock of +another; saw her pause to listen to the complaint of a sobbing lad and +smartly box the ears of his tormentor. Then another glimmering of the +Gray Gentleman’s meaning, when he called these two “sisters,” came into +Bonny-Gay’s mind. + +“She has to take care of the children down here just as I do in our +park. I suppose we two are the only ones have time to bother, but how +can she do it! Her face is so pretty--prettier, even, than Nettie’s, +but I dare not look at the rest of her. I just dare not. Poor little +girl, how she must ache! Supposing I was that way. My arms stretched +way down there, and my feet shortened way up here, and my back all +scrouged up so! Oh! poor, poor Mary Jane! It hurts me just to make +believe and she has it all the time. But here she comes back and I +mustn’t let her see I notice her looks. I mustn’t, for anything. It’s +bad enough to have her body hurt, I mustn’t hurt her feelings, too.” + +However, there was no sign of suffering about the little cripple as +she returned to the side of her guest, dragging the soap-box wagon +behind her and recklessly rolling the baby about in it, so eager was +her advance. There were tears in Bonny-Gay’s eyes for a moment, though, +till she caught sight of the baby and heard Mary Jane exclaim: + +“Did you ever see such a sight? What do you s’pose mother will say? +The teacher set him in the sand-box and somebody gave him a stick of +’lasses candy, and he’s messed from head to foot. But isn’t he a dear?” +and dropping to the ground she caught the little one to her breast and +covered his sandy, bedaubed countenance with adoring kisses. + +“He’s the funniest thing I ever saw!” laughed Bonny-Gay, so merrily +that the Gray Gentleman drew near to join in the fun. After him trailed +an army of young “farmers” and in another moment the visitor had ceased +to be a stranger to anybody there. + +“Let’s see-saw!” cried Joe Stebbins, seizing her hand and drawing her +to the playground. Then somebody swung Mary Jane and the baby upon the +beam beside her, some other girls took the opposite end, and they all +went tilting up and down, up and down, in the most exciting manner +possible. Then there was the Maypole, furnished with ropes instead of +ribbons, from the ends of which they hung and swung, around and around, +till they dropped off for sheer weariness. And here Bonny-Gay was proud +to see that Mary Jane could beat the whole company. Her arms were so +long and so strong, they could cling and outswing all the others; and +when she had held to her rope until she was the very last one left her +laughter rang out in a way that was good to hear. + +“Seems to me I never heard so much laughing in all my life!” exclaimed +Bonny-Gay to the Gray Gentleman when, tired out with fun, she nestled +beside him as he rested on a bench. + +“Yes, it’s a fine thing, a fine thing. And you see that it doesn’t take +big houses or rich clothes to make happiness. All these new friends of +yours belong to those tiny homes we passed on our way down.” + +“They do! Even Mary Jane, my sister?” + +“Even in an humbler. Dingy street is just what its name implies. But +we’ll drive that way back and what do you say to giving Mary Jane a +ride thus far?” + +“Oh! I’d love it! She’s so jolly and friendly and seems never to think +of her--her poor back and--things.” + +“You’ll like her better and better--if you should ever meet again. +She won my heart the first time I saw her, over a month ago. I met +her dragging home a basket of her mother’s laundry work, in that same +soap-box wagon she utilizes for the baby. The family chariot it seems +to be. I was taking a stroll this way, quite by myself, and thinking of +other things than where I was walking when I stumbled and my hat flew +off. Then I heard a rattle and squeak of rusty small wheels, and there +was Mary Jane hopping up to me on her ‘wooden feet’ and holding out my +hat, with the most sympathetic smile in the world. ‘Here it is, Mister, +and I do hope it isn’t hurt; nor you either,’ said she; and in just +that one glimpse I had of her I saw how sweet and brave and helpful she +was. So I’ve been proud to call her my friend ever since.” + +Just then arose a cry so sudden and boisterous it could have been +uttered by no lips except the baby’s. For a teacher had tapped a bell, +and somebody had cried ‘Luncheon!’ and he knew what that meant as well +as anyone. + +So Mary Jane swung round to where he lay upon his back in the sunshine +and set him up against a rock, and thrust a piece of the loaf she had +brought into his chubby fists, and cocked her head admiringly while she +cried out: + +“Did anybody ever see so cute a child as he!” + +Then she remembered the visitors and with the truest hospitality +proffered them the broken loaf. + +“I ought to have given it to you the first, I know that, but he’d have +yelled constant if I hadn’t tended him. It’s wonderful, I think, how +he knows that bell!” + +“Wonderful!” echoed the Gray Gentleman, as he bowed and gravely broke a +tiny portion from the small stale loaf. + +Bonny-Gay was going to decline, but when she saw the Gray Gentleman’s +action, she checked her “No, I thank you” unspoken and also accepted +a crumbly crust. After which Mary Jane distributed several other bits +among some clamorous charges and finally sat down with the last morsel +to enjoy that herself in their presence. + +“I think dinner never tastes so good as it does out-doors here, in our +park,” she remarked with a sigh of satisfaction. + +“Dinner!” cried Bonny-Gay and looked into the Gray Gentleman’s face. +But from something she saw there she was warned to say no more; and +she made a brave effort to swallow her own crust without letting her +entertainer see how distasteful a matter it was. + +After this the Gray Gentleman saw a cloud arising and though he did not +fear a shower for himself he was anxious that Bonny-Gay should take no +harm from her unusual outing. So he called the coachman to bring up +the carriage and had Mary Jane and the baby lifted in. Then Bonny-Gay +sprang after them, and the master himself made his adieux to the +teachers and followed, watched by the admiring, maybe envious, glances +of many bright eyes. + +However, one carriage, no matter how capacious, cannot hold a whole +kindergarten, and neither could it carry the pleasant “Playgrounds” +away; so if there was any envy it did not last long. Which was a good +thing, too, seeing what happened so soon afterward. + +The landau had not progressed far toward Dingy street and Mary Jane +was still wearing the feather-trimmed hat, which her new friend had +persuaded her to put on just to surprise Mrs. Bump, when there came a +rush, a bark, a series of shrieks, and the high-spirited horses were +off at a mad gallop; which grew wilder and wilder, and soon passed +quite beyond control of coachman or even the Gray Gentleman, who had +promptly seized the reins as they fell from the driver’s hands, but +had been powerless to do more than retain them in his tightly clutched +fingers. + +It seemed an age that the frantic beasts sped onward, following their +own will, before the crash came and they tore themselves free, leaving +the hindering vehicle to go to ruin against the great post, where +it struck. But it was, in reality, not more than half a moment, and +when the reins were wrenched from his grasp the Gray Gentleman looked +anxiously about him to learn if anyone was hurt. + +Mary Jane and the baby were on the floor of the carriage, safe and +sound. The terrified footman was clinging to his seat behind; the +coachman had either leaped or been thrown out, but had landed upon his +feet; but where was Bonny-Gay? + +A white, motionless little figure lay face downward in the dust, a rod +away, and over this bent a black, shaggy dog, whining and moaning in a +way that was almost human. + +“Max! Max! Was it you, was it you! Oh! wretched animal, what have you +done!” + +Max it was. But, at the sight of his silent playmate and the altered +sound of a familiar voice, a cowed, unhappy Max; who crouched and slunk +away as the Gray Gentleman lifted from the roadway the limp figure of +his own beloved Bonny-Gay. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +MAX REAPPEARS + + +There was neither drug store nor doctor’s office near, and the Gray +Gentleman’s instant decision was to carry Bonny-Gay to Mrs. Bump’s +house. Strong man though he was he felt almost faint with anxiety as he +sprang from the carriage and without losing an instant of time lifted +out Mary Jane and the baby. Then he dropped her crutches beside her and +ran to the child in the roadway. + +Five minutes later, Bonny-Gay was lying on Mrs. Bump’s bed, and +the Gray Gentleman had gone away in pursuit of aid, leaving a last +injunction behind him as he disappeared: + +“Do everything you can for her, I beg, but keep useless people out.” + +Thus it was that, though curious faces peered in at the window, no +person save Mrs. Stebbins crossed the threshold of their neighbor’s +house, and the two women were left unhindered to minister to the +injured child as best they knew how. They were not able, indeed, to +restore the little girl to consciousness; but they had cleared the +soil of the street from her face and clothing and had placed the inert +figure in an easy posture, long before there was heard the rattle and +dash of another approaching vehicle, and a doctor’s phaeton drew up at +the door. + +The surgeon’s examination showed that one of the child’s legs was +broken but this did not trouble him half so much as her continued +unconsciousness. But he worked diligently to restore her and to prepare +the injured limb for removal to her own home. + +From a low seat in the corner and hugging the baby tight, to keep him +quiet, Mary Jane watched the little sufferer upon her mother’s bed, +with wide, dry eyes and heaving breast. + +“Oh! if I could only take it for her!” she thought, helplessly. “It +wouldn’t have mattered to anybody like me, ’cause I’m all crooked +anyhow; but her! She was that straight and beautiful--my sake! It +mustn’t be--it mustn’t! And she didn’t mind. She let me wear her hat, +me. Well, that didn’t get hurt, any way. It just tumbled off all safe. +I had to wear it home, else I couldn’t have dragged the baby, and I +don’t know not a thing whatever became of his wagon. Never mind that, +though. If she only would open her eyes, just once, just once!” + +But they had not opened even when, a half-hour later, another carriage +paused before the Bumps’ tenement, and a tall, pale lady descended, +trembling so that she had almost to be carried by the Gray Gentleman +who supported her. + +This was Mrs. McClure and she had just been stepping into her own +vehicle for a morning’s shopping when he reached her door, bringing +his unhappy message. So there was no time lost in securing a vehicle +and the mother was soon at her child’s bedside. At any other hour she +might have shrunk from entering so poor a place but at that moment she +had, for once, forgotten her own high station and thought only of her +darling. + +One glimpse of the lovely face, so still and unresponsive, banished the +mother’s last vestige of strength and she would have fallen where she +stood, had not Mrs. Bump slipped an arm about her and motioned Mrs. +Stebbins to bring the one sound chair the room could boast. The doctor +held a glass of water to her lips and the faintness passed. + +“Is--she--alive?” + +“Yes. She is still alive,” answered the physician, gravely, and Mrs. +McClure turned faint again. + +“Of course, she’s alive, lady; and what’s more it won’t be long, I +reckon, before she’ll be asking a lot of questions all about what’s +happened her. Oh! yes indeed. I’ve seen ’em a sight worst than she is, +and up and around again as lively as crickets. Why, there’s my Mary +Jane--” + +But the cripple held up a warning finger and Mrs. Bump ceased speaking. +Though not her helpful ministrations; for with a whisk to the stove she +had seized a coarse brown teapot and poured from it a hot draught into +a cup that had no handle, indeed, yet could serve as well as another to +refresh an exhausted creature. + +“Here, honey, just sip this. Strong, I know, and not the finest, but +’twill set you up, quick. I know. There, there.” + +Moved by the same instinct which had made Bonny-Gay accept her crust +dinner, Mrs. McClure drank the scalding liquid and did, indeed, revive +under it. Then the doctor and the Gray Gentleman lifted the injured +child and placed her gently upon the carriage seat. + +Seeing which, the mother hastily rose and followed, supported still, +though unnoticed on her part, by the strong arms of the other mother +whose sympathetic tears were now silently flowing; even while her +cheery voice reiterated, much to the surgeon’s disgust: + +“Never you fear, dear lady. She’ll be as right as a trivet. Aye, +indeed; she’ll be talking to you before you get to your own house. Yes, +indeed. We poor folks see many an accident and mostly they don’t amount +to much; even my Mary Jane--” + +But there was Mary Jane herself just as the carriage door was closing, +thrusting something white and feather-trimmed into the pale lady’s lap. + +“Her hat, lady. Bonny-Gay’s best hat!” + +Mrs. McClure was as kind hearted as most, yet at that moment she was +already unstrung, and the glimpse she caught of poor Mary Jane’s +deformity shocked her afresh. Without intending it she did shrink +away from contact with so “repulsive” a child and Mrs. Bump saw +the movement. Her own face hardened and she withdrew her arm from +supporting the stranger to clasp it about her own child. + +But Mary Jane saw nothing, save that Bonny-Gay was being carried away +without her beautiful headgear, and again she thrust it eagerly forward. + +“Her hat! Her lovely hat! She mustn’t go without her Sunday hat!” + +It was the sweetest, most sympathetic of voices and almost startling to +the rich woman, coming as it did from such a source. It made her take +a second look at the cripple and this time, fortunately, the glance +rested upon the child’s fine, spiritual face. An instant regret for +the repugnance she had first felt shot through Mrs. McClure’s mind and +leaning from the carriage window she dropped the hat upon Mary Jane’s +dark head. + +“Keep it, little girl, as a gift from Bonny-Gay. It will delight her +that you should have it. Quick now, coachman. Swift and careful!” + +Then they were all gone and Mary Jane, bedecked in her unusual finery, +stood leaning upon her crutches, crying as if her heart would break. +Her mother glanced at her hastily but thought it best to let “her +have her cry out. She cries so seldom it ought to do her good,” she +reflected. Besides, there was the baby rolling on the floor, in +imminent danger from a wash-boiler full of steaming water; and a whole +hour wasted from her own exacting labors. + +Presently, the hunchback felt something cold and wet touch her +down-hanging hand and dashed the tears from her eyes to see what it +might be. There sat a great black dog beside her, so close that he +almost forced her crutch away. His eyes were fixed upon her face in a +mute appeal for sympathy, and his whole bearing showed as much sorrow +as her tears had done. Her first impulse was to shrink away from him, +even to strike at him with the crutch, as she indignantly exclaimed: + +“You’re the very dog did it! You jumped into the wagon and scared the +horses. If it hadn’t been for you she wouldn’t have been hurt. Go ’way! +Go away off out of sight! You horrid, ugly, mean old dog!” + +Mary Jane’s vehemence surprised even herself and she shook her head so +vigorously that the feather-trimmed hat fell off into the dust. + +Then was a transformation. Max--it was, indeed he!--had already +dropped flat upon his stomach and crouched thus, whining and moaning +in a manner that betokened such suffering that it quickly conquered +the cripple’s anger; and now, as the hat fell right before his nose, +he began to smell of it and lick it with the most extravagant joy. A +moment later he had sprung up, caught the hat in his teeth, and was +gambolling all around and around Mary Jane, as if he were the very +happiest dog in the world. + +“My sake! How you act! And oh--oh--oh! I know you, I know you! You must +be that Max-dog that she told me about. That she’d known all her life +and wouldn’t be let come any more to her park! I guess I can see the +whole thing. I guess you run away from that man the gardener gave you +to. Maybe you went right back to where ‘Father George’ and the lion +are; and maybe you saw Bonny-Gay and the Gray Gentleman come away; and +maybe you followed them. Maybe it was because you were so glad, and not +bad, that you jumped into the carriage and scared the horses. Oh! you +poor doggie, if that is how it is!” + +Which was, in fact, exactly what had happened; and it seemed that the +intelligent animal, who had loved Bonny-Gay ever since she was first +wheeled about the beautiful Place in her baby-carriage, had now a +comprehension of the damage his delight at finding her again had done. + +So Mary Jane hopped back into the house and called Max by that name to +follow her. He did so, readily, and sat down very near to the foot of +the bed on which she carefully placed his little mistress’ hat. + +“Well, daughter, this has been a morning, hasn’t it? Now, these +handkerchiefs are ready to iron and I’ve fixed your high seat right +close to my tub, so whilst I wash you can iron away and tell me the +whole story and all about it. Here comes father, too, and it’ll pass +the time for him to hear it. And, oh! William! you never could guess +whatever has happened right here in this very kitchen, this very +morning that ever was! But, I must work now, and Mary Jane’ll talk.” + +Talk she did and fast; and under her eloquence Bonny-Gay became quite +the most wonderful child in the world: + +“The beautifullest, the kindest, the friendliest that ever lived. It +didn’t ’pear to make a mite of difference that she was all so fixed up +in her clothes; she played games as lively as the next one. She hung on +to the Maypole ropes near as long as I did, and if I’d known what was +coming I’d have dropped off quick and let her win the count. And my! +how she did enjoy her dinner off my loaf! To see her little white hands +hold it up to her lips and see her just nibble, nibble--Why, mother +Bump! ’Twould have done your heart good!” + +“Eat your dinner, did she? Wish to goodness it had choked her!” growled +William Bump, from the doorstep. + +“Why, father! W-h-y!” gasped Mary Jane, amazed. + +The man replied only by whistling Max to him, and by stroking the dog’s +head when the whistle had been obeyed. + +But when the cripple had reached that part of her story descriptive of +the final accident, the father spoke again and this time with even a +more vindictive earnestness than before. + +“Broke her leg, did it? Glad of it. Never was gladder of anything in +all my life. Hope she’ll suffer a lot. Hope--What better is she, his +little girl, than you, my Mary Jane? Glad there is something that evens +matters up. I hope his heart’ll ache till it comes as near breakin’ +as mine--every time I look at your poor crooked shoulders, you poor +miserable child! So I do!” + +Both Mrs. Bump and Mary Jane were aghast at the awfulness of this +desire. Even the baby had paused open-mouthed and silent, as if he, +too, could comprehend the dreadful words and be shocked by them. Only +Max remained undisturbed, even nestled the closer to the blue-shirted +man, who in some manner reminded him of his old master, Mr. Weems. + +Then Mrs. Bump found her voice, and though she was a loyal wife she did +not hesitate in this emergency to give her husband a very indignant +reproof. So indignant, in fact, that she forgot the caution of many +years, and with her hand on William’s shoulder, demanded fiercely: + +“You say that, you? You! You dare to rejoice in the misfortunes +of others when it was by your own fault--your own fault, William +Bump!--that our poor lass sits yonder a cripple for life. When I +left her in your care that I might go and intercede for you to be +given a fresh trial at the works, what was it but that you loved the +drink better than the child? and left her on the high ledge while you +slept--a human log! Yet you were sorry enough afterwards and you should +take shame to yourself for your wickedness. It’s the drink again that’s +in you, this day; and that has lost you another job and turned your +once good heart into a cruel beast’s! So that is what I think of you, +and my--” + +Then she turned and there sat Mary Jane, listening, horror-struck and +broken-hearted! + +Regret was useless. The secret, guarded so jealously for years, was now +disclosed. Till then the hunchback had believed her affliction was hers +from birth, and had never dreamed that it was the result of a terrible +fall, due to her own father’s carelessness. He had always seemed to +love her so, with a sort of remorseful tenderness quite different from +the attention he gave to his other, healthier children. But if it had +all been by his fault! + +Poor Mary Jane! Alas, alas! Far worse for her was the anger and +hatred that at that moment sprang to life in her tortured heart. As +in a picture she saw other little maids, her playmates, even this +recent vision of Bonny-Gay, straight-limbed, strong, active, enjoying +everything without aid of those hindering crutches or the heavy +dragging limbs. + +“Oh! father! you did it? you! And I ought to have been like them--I +ought--I ought!” + +Nobody spoke after that. Mary Jane’s head sank down upon the high table +where stood her little flatiron, fast cooling. Mrs. Bump felt a new and +deadly faintness seize her own vigorous body and sat weakly down. How +could she undo the mischief she had wrought? Until now there had been +between the father and the child such a wonderful affection that it +had been a matter of constant comment among all the neighbors, and the +mother had been proud that this was so. Now--what had she done, what +had she done! + +Presently, William Bump rose, put on his hat, whistled to Max, and +walked out. At the door he paused, cast one miserable glance over the +little room and his face was very white beneath its stains of toil +and weather. His eyes seemed mutely to seek for one ray of pity, of +forgiveness; but Mary Jane’s head was still upon the table and her +mother’s face was hidden in her own labor-hardened palms. + +Only the baby began to coo and gurgle in a way which, under ordinary +circumstances, would have elicited admiring exclamations, but which now +secured no response. So, then he rolled over and closed his eyes; and +not even he saw when the man and the dog passed clear out of sight, +across the open lots, and toward the marshy places which led to the +water and the unknown country beyond. + +By-and-by, the other children came home from the “Playgrounds,” full of +chatter about the day’s delights and eager with questions concerning +the wonderful happening of Mary Jane’s ride. Then the mother roused and +kept them from troubling their sister, and dispatched them to examine +the wrecked carriage, away down the street. + +By the time they returned Mary Jane’s eyes were no longer red and there +was nothing out of common in her manner. Mrs. Bump was ironing away +as if her life depended on it, and even humming the first strains of +a hymn, “Lord, in the morning, Thou shalt, Thou shalt--Lord, in the +morning Thou shalt hear.” This always denoted an extra cheerfulness +on the singer’s part, and the children became boisterously happy in +proportion. + +When supper time came they “set a place for father,” just as always; +and though even by the end of the meal he had not appeared his unused +plate was still left, as if he might come in at any moment. + +Yet it was quite midnight when Mary Jane, for once unable to sleep, +crept down to her mother’s room and called, softly: + +“Has he come, mother?” + +“No dearie, not yet. But it’s not late, you know for--him!” replied +the wife, so cheerfully, that even her quick-witted daughter did not +suspect the heartache beneath the cheerfulness, nor the tear-stained +face upon the pillow. + +“When he does, I wish you’d call me. I must tell him it’s--it’s all +just right.” + +“Yes, darling. Trust mother and go to sleep now. I’ll call you sure.” + +And neither guessed how long that call would be delayed. + + + + +CHAPTER V + +MARY JANE GOES VISITING + + +But Mary Jane Bump was not the girl to be gloomy over anything for +very long; least of all over anything so trifling as her own personal +afflictions; and the morning saw her hopping about in her narrow home, +as merry, as loving, and as helpful as ever. Even more helpful, it +seemed to the conscience-stricken mother, than before she had felt the +fierce anger of the previous day. + +“Appears like she’d try to make even me forget she ever heard what +I said, poor lamb! Well, I still think, what I’ve so often thought, +that the Lord did bring sweet out of that bitter, when He made her so +beautiful inside, even if she is crooked without. And more’n that, to +me she don’t seem so misshaped. I almost forget she ain’t just like the +rest. Aye, honey? What’s that you say?” + +“If you can spare me, mother, after all the work is done, I’d like to +go to Bonny-Gay’s house and find out about her. Oh! do you s’pose she +will get well?” + +“Sure, child.” + +“I guess she will, too. Can I, mother? When the work’s all done?” + +“Bless you, my lass, and that will never be. So there’s no use tarrying +for such a time. And I don’t blame you for wanting to go. I’d admire to +hear myself. But I guess it’s a long step from here and I don’t know +the way, even I don’t. You’d have to ride in a street car and that +costs money--which is one of the things I can least spare.” + +At mention of the car, Mary Jane’s eyes sparkled. + +On rare occasions--once when she went to market with her mother, +at holiday time, and once when the wash had been too large and the +patron’s home too distant for even her nimble crutches--she had enjoyed +the luxury of travel by electricity. In imagination, she could still +feel the swift rush of air against her cheek, could see the houses +hurrying past, and hear the delightful ting-a-ling of the bell, as the +motorman stopped to let the passengers on or off. She had not dreamed +that it would be necessary for her to ride, in order to pay the visit +she desired; but if it were--Oh! felicity! + +The light in the eyes she loved decided the mother upon the indulgence. +A car-ride meant a nickel, or part of one, at least, for even little +Mary Jane; and a nickel would buy a loaf, and many loaves were needful +where there were seven mouths to fill, and every mouth a hungry one. +More than that, if William were out of work-- + +Mrs. Bump considered no further. Mary Jane should have the pleasure--no +matter what happened afterward. + +“Of course, you’ll ride! Why not? Don’t suppose I’d let you start off +a-foot for such a length, do you? I’ve a notion that this Mt. Vernon +Place is away at the other end the city. Leastwise, it must be a good +bit from Dingy street, ’cause I never heard of it before, and I’ve been +around the neighborhood considerable, with the wash, you know. Yes, you +may go. Fly round right smart and get your clothes changed. What a fine +thing it is that your other frock is clean, and I must say I did have +good luck ironing it, last week.” + +“You always do have good luck, mother Bump! You’re the very loveliest +ironer in the world!” and the wooden feet clicked across the room that +their owner might hug this famous laundress. + +“And you’re a partial little girl, honey.” + +“But, mother, dear, the work isn’t done--yet. There’s the steps to be +scrubbed and that other pile of hank’chiefs, and--” + +“Well, I reckon we’ll live just as long if our steps ain’t done for one +day in the year. Besides, I might let one the younger ones do them and +see. They’re always teasing to, you know. Strange, how human nature +loves to mess in a pail of soap and water.” + +“Who’ll mind the baby, if I go?” + +“I will, Mary Jane Bump! Seem to think the precious youngster ain’t +hardly safe in his own mother’s hands, do you? Run along, run along, +girlie, and fix yourself fine.” + +Away up the narrow stair swung happy Mary Jane; and in a very few +moments down she swung again. She had exchanged her blue gingham for +her pink print, had dusted off the shoes which, alas! were so useless +that they rarely wore out! and had brushed her dark wavy hair till +it floated about her sweet face, as fine and fleece-like as it was +possible for hair to be. In her hands she carried two hats; her own +little plain “sailor,” and the gift of Bonny-Gay. + +“Oh! I wouldn’t wear--” began Mrs. Bump, answering the question in Mary +Jane’s eyes; then seeing the disappointment which crept into them, +hastily altered her original judgment to fit the case. “I wouldn’t +wear that old ‘sailor’ if I was a little girl that owned feathers like +those. Indeedy, that I wouldn’t.” + +Mary Jane’s face rippled with smiles and for almost the first time in +her life she did a coquettish thing. Standing upon her crutches before +the tiny looking-glass, hung at an angle above the mantel, she adjusted +and readjusted the pretty leghorn, until she had placed it as nearly in +the position it had occupied on Bonny-Gay’s yellow curls as she could. +Then she wheeled about and asked: + +“Does it look right, mother? Just as right as she would like to have +it, when she sees me?” + +“Perfect, honey! And though I maybe oughtn’t to say it before you, +you’re the very sweetest little girl in Baltimore city!” + +“Ah! but, mother Bump, you haven’t seen all the others!” laughed the +child. + +“Now, here’s your money. Two nickels, dear. I’ve just given them a bit +of a polish in the suds while you were up-stairs. One is to go with, +and one to come home. I’ve been puzzling it out, and the best thing is +for you to go to the nearest car-line you find; then ask the conductor +how nigh it will take you to the Place. He’ll be kind to you, I know. +They’re always obliging, the conductors are, and when it’s anybody +like you, why they just seem to tear themselves to pieces to be nice. +You’ll have no trouble, honey, not a mite. And when you get there, +don’t forget to make your manners, pretty, like I’ve taught you. Say +everything to cheer the lady up, if she seems down-hearted a bit, and +good-by, good-by. Bless you, Mary Jane!” + +Mrs. Bump stood at her doorway and Mrs. Stebbins at hers, to watch +the little figure hop away, and when it turned at the corner and they +caught a glimpse of the radiant face beneath the picture-hat, they +smiled upon each other well satisfied. + +“No harm’ll happen to her!” said Mrs. Stebbins, confidently. “She’s one +of the Lord’s own.” + +“I’m not fearing! though I’m going to miss her powerful,” answered the +mother, and retired to her tub. + +Mary Jane’s heart beat so with excitement that she could hardly +breathe. Here she was, going alone on an unknown journey, to ride in +a car quite by herself, and to pay her own fare exactly as if she +were a grown-up. She had to tightly clutch that corner of her little +handkerchief wherein the nickles were tied, to make herself realize the +delightful fact; and already, in her dutiful heart, she was planning +how she could save, by not eating quite so much of her portion of food, +and so, in time, make up to her mother for this unwonted extravagance. + +Indeed, she thought so fast and deeply, that she stood on the corner +and let the first car go by without signalling it. Then she brought her +wits to the present and when the next one whizzed up she was ready for +it, raising her hand and motioning it to stop, as she had seen other +people do. + +It did stop, of course, and to such a little passenger, also, of +course, the conductor was quite as kind as Mrs. Bump had prophesied he +would be. He lifted Mary Jane into the very front seat of all and he +would have been glad not to take a fare from her. But this his duty +compelled him to do, and when he had received it he paused a moment +beside her to inquire: + +“Taking a ride, are you? Well, it’s a nice morning.” + +“Isn’t it! Just beautiful. Yes, I’m going to Mt. Vernon Place.” + +“Whew! you are? Well, this is the wrong car--Never mind. You can +transfer. Mt. Vernon Place is a long way from here and quite the +swellest part of the town; you know that, I suppose.” + +“It’s where Bonny-Gay lives.” + +“Oh! indeed. Well, don’t you worry. I’ll look out for you and pass you +along. Company allows only one transfer, now, but I’ll fix it. It’ll be +all right. Don’t worry.” + +Mary Jane had not the slightest intention of worrying. That was +something she had never done until the night before, and then about +her missing father. But in this brilliant sunshine, with the world all +her own, so to speak, even that anxiety had disappeared. He would be +sure to return and very soon. He loved them all so dearly, and even +for herself, if there were none others, he would come. He couldn’t +live without her; he had often told her so. Therefore she merely hoped +he was having as good a time, at that moment, as she was; and settled +herself serenely in her place to enjoy everything. + +She never forgot the first part of that day’s ride. There were few +passengers in the car and these were all men, quite able to look out +for themselves; so the conductor remained near her and talked of the +places they passed, pointing out this building and that, for Mary +Jane’s enlightenment. She bestowed upon each an attention that was +quite flattering to her entertainer, till the car turned another corner +and he had to move away. People came more frequently now and at every +block of their advance, the men and women seemed to Mary Jane to crowd +and hurry more and more. They almost crushed her own small person, +climbing past her, but she still clung sturdily to the outer corner of +her seat, as her friend, the conductor, had bidden her. + +“No need for you to move up, little girl. You’ll be changing after a +bit, and it’ll be easier for them than you.” + +Right in the very business part of the city the car stopped and he came +back to her, thrusting a pale green slip of paper into her hand, and +hurriedly lifting her out. + +“That’s your transfer. Yonder’s your car. Give that paper to the +other conductor. He’ll help you on. Say, Snyder!” he called to his +co-laborer. “This kid’s for Vernon Place. Put her off at Charles +street, will you? and pass her along. I’ll make it right with the +company.” + +Then he was gone and Mary Jane stood bewildered in the midst of a +throng of vehicles, and street cars, and busy, rushing people. For +an instant her head whirled, then she saw the impatient beckoning of +conductor Snyder, and swung herself toward the waiting car. A man, +into whose path she had hopped, caught her up and placed her on the +platform, and again she was off. + +But this time she was merely one of a crowd and the ticket collecting +kept Mr. Snyder too busy to bother with any single passenger. Indeed, +some slight hindrance just as they reached Charles street put Mary Jane +and her destination quite out of mind, and it was not until they had +gone some blocks beyond and he had chanced to come near her again that +she ventured to ask: + +“Are we almost there?” + +“Where’s there?” + +“He--he said--Charles street,” she answered abashed by his brusque +manner. + +“Charles street! Why, that’s long back. Did you want to get off there? +Oh! I forgot. You’re the child--Well, such as you ought not to be +traveling alone. Here. I’ll put you off now, you can walk back. Ask +anybody you meet, and they’ll direct you. Wait. I’ll give you another +transfer. It’s against rules, but the other fellow’s responsible.” + +This time it was a yellow slip Mary Jane received and again she was +set down in the midst of a confusing crowd. She was in imminent +danger of being run over, and saw that; so promptly retreated to the +curbstone and from thence watched the unending procession of cars, +which followed one another without a moment’s break. For just there it +happened that many railway lines used the same tracks and it would have +puzzled a much more experienced person than Mary Jane to distinguish +between them. + +Finally, she grew so tired and confused with the watching and the +racket that she resolved to walk; and set out boldly in the direction +from which she had come, scanning the street name-signs upon the +corners. It seemed to her she would never come to that she sought, but +she did, at last; and here a new difficulty presented. + +“Which way shall I go? this--or that? Oh! dear! The time is going so +fast and I don’t get there. I’ll have to ask somebody the way.” + +But though she made several shy little efforts to attract attention, +not a passer-by paused to answer her low question. Almost all fancied +her an unfortunate, petitioning alms; and some thought her a street +merchant with something to sell. Many and many an one had gone by, till +in the midst of all these men she saw a woman. + +Only a scrub-woman, to be sure, on her way to some office to her daily +labor; but she paused when the cripple spoke to her and looked with +feminine curiosity at the plainly clothed child in her expensive hat. + +“Mt. Vernon Place! Why, child alive, it’s miles from here! Away up +yonder. This is Charles and it does run straight enough, that’s so, to +where you want to go. But it’s so far, little girl. And you a cripple. +You’d much best go back home and let some older person do your errand. +Whatever was your ma thinkin’ of, to send you such a bout?” + +“She didn’t send me, I came because I wished. Can you tell me which car +is right? and will this yellow ticket pay my way?” + +The woman examined the transfer-slip, glanced at a clock on a near-by +building, and shook her head. + +“That’s the car, all right, but that transfer’s no good. After fifteen +minutes they won’t take ’em, and it’s half an hour or more. No. You’ll +have to pay a second fare. I’ll help you on, if you like. Where do you +live?” + +“Ninety-seven, Dingy street.” + +“The land! That’s almost the jumping off place of the city. Did they +give you only money enough to ride twice.” + +“My mother gave me ten cents,” answered Mary Jane, proudly, yet +somehow, the fortune which had seemed so big, a little while before, +now appeared very small and inadequate. + +“Pshaw! If I had a cent I’d give it to you. I don’t know what you’d +better do.” + +“I know. I’ll walk. And thank you for telling me the way. If I keep +right on this street, and go up and up, will I surely, surely get +there.” + +“Sure. I know, ’cause I used to clean up in that neighborhood. I hope +you’ll have luck. Good-by.” + +“Good-by,” answered Mary Jane, smilingly. + +The momentary pause and conversation had rested her and she now felt +wholly equal to any demands upon her strength. If she had merely to +follow this one avenue till she came in sight of the monument and the +lion, why! that was as easy as A, B, C! So she set out with fresh +courage and full enjoyment of every novel sight or sound by the way; +though, all the while, watchfully reading the street sign at every +corner she reached. + +It was almost two hours later that she came in sight of the Place. +She knew it in a moment, even though she had had but the one brief +description of it from Bonny-Gay’s lips, and she felt as if she had +come into a new and wonderful world. + +“How big and still and--and--finished it looks! And, oh! how tired I +am. My arms ache like they never did before, and I can hardly hold my +crutches. I’ll get to that low stone round the monument--that’s where +she sits with the Gray Gentleman--and I’ll get rested. Then I’ll look +all around and pick out her house. I shall know it because she said it +was all covered with vines and there was a big yard behind, with trees +and things. Oh! how good it is to sit down.” + +So good, indeed, that before she knew it the exhausted little maid had +dropped her head upon the curbing and fallen fast asleep. + +There Mr. Weems discovered her and would have roused her to send her +home. But a second glance at her convinced him that this was no child +of that locality, and that she seemed a very weary little girl, indeed. +So he simply folded his own jacket and placed it under her head and +left her to recover herself. + +She awoke after a little time and sat up, confused and rather +frightened. Till she suddenly remembered where she was and, seeing a +gardener at work upon a grass-plot near, decided at once that he must +be the owner of Max. She saw, too, the coat which had formed her pillow +and knew that he must have placed it there. With a glad cry she caught +up her crutches and swung herself toward the keeper: + +“Oh! sir, I thank you. I was so tired and the coat was lovely soft. And +I know you. You’re Mr. Weems, the gardener, and I’ve seen Max. He’s at +our house, I mean he was--last night. And he will be again, ’cause he’s +with father, who’ll fetch him back. Father just loves dogs and animals. +And say, please, which is Bonny-Gay’s house?” + +“Bless my soul! You don’t say? Then you must belong around here, though +I didn’t think it. You’ve seen Max, and you ask for our Bonny-Gay! +Well, you’ve struck trouble both times. He’s in trouble enough, but she +in worse. That’s her home, yonder, on the west corner. The green house +I call it; with those doctors’ carriages in front of it.” + +“It is? Why, how funny. What’s all that straw for?” + +The gardener shook his head, sadly, and hastily flicked away at his +eyes. + +“That’s to deaden all the noise. Bonny-Gay is a very, very sick little +girl and there’s about one chance in a thousand, folks think, for +her to get well. She was in an accident, yesterday. Got thrown out a +carriage. The gentleman that took her driving is almost crazy with +grief about it and--What’s that? What’s that you say? You was with her? +You? And that’s her hat--Upon my word, it is. She showed it to me, the +very first day she had it, while she was out here waiting to go driving +with her folks. And she’s the only one they’ve got. I reckon her poor +father would give all his millions of dollars and not stop a minute to +think about it, if he could make her well by doing it. Poor man, I pity +him!” + +“It was Max did it, you know. I’ve come to see her, and you mustn’t +tell me she’s so sick as that. Why, she was that beautiful to +me--I--I--” + +Waiting not an instant longer, and despite the gardener’s warning, Mary +Jane clicked across the smooth path, over the street, and up to the +very front door of the mansion, wherein lay a precious little form, +incessantly watched by a crowd of nurses and friends. + +The outer door was ajar, a footman standing just within, keeping guard +and ready to answer in a whisper the constant string of inquiries which +neighbors sent to make. Past him, while he was talking to another, +slipped Mary Jane, her crutches making no sound upon the thick carpet. +One thought possessed her, one only; and made her almost unconscious +of the novel scenes about her. Bonny-Gay was ill. Bonny-Gay might die. +Well, she would have one more glimpse of that beloved face, no matter +who tried to stop her. + +Her brain worked fast. Sick people were generally up-stairs; up-stairs +she sped. Sick folks had to be quiet. She paused an instant and peered +down the dim corridor. She saw that as the people passing along +this hall approached a distant door they moved even more gently and +cautiously. In that room, then, lay her darling! + +It seemed like the passage of some bird, so swift she was and so +unerring, for before even the most watchful of the nurses could +intervene she had entered the darkened chamber and crossed to a white +cot in the middle of it. By that time it was too late to stop her. Any +noise, any excitement, however trivial, might prove fatal, the doctors +thought. + +Bonny-Gay lay, shorn of her beautiful curls, almost as white as her +pillows. But the small head moved restlessly, incessantly, and the +silence of the night had given place to a delirious, rambling talk. All +her troubled fancies seemed to be of the last scenes she had witnessed: +the “Playgrounds,” with the eager children crowding them. She was +see-sawing with Jimmy O’Brien, and hoeing cabbages with the baby. She +laughed at some inner picture of his absurd accidents, and finally, as +some peril menaced him, raised her shoulders slightly and shrieked: + +“Mary Jane! Oh! Mary Jane--come quick!” + +All the watchers caught their breath--startled, fearful of the worst. +Yet upon the silence that followed the cry, there rose the sweetest, +the gladdest of voices: + +“Why, yes, Bonny-Gay! I’ve come!” + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +THE FLIGHT AND FRIGHT OF MARY JANE + + +Again Mary Jane’s thoughts had been swift. She recalled the fact that +“when Joe Stebbins had the fever and talked crazy-like, the doctor said +we must answer just as if ’twas the way he said. ’Twould have made +him worse to argue him different,” and with this reflection made her +instant response. + +Now Bonny-Gay had either been less ill than they fancied, or the crisis +had been reached; for at that cheerful reply she opened her blue eyes +and looked into the eager face so near them. For a brief time she said +no more, seeming to seek for some explanation of those troubled dreams +from the steadfast smile of her new friend; then she stretched out her +hand and Mary Jane caught it rapturously between her own palms. + +“You--you look nice in my hat. But I thought--I thought--I was at your +park. Yet it’s home, isn’t it, after all. How dark it is, and how tired +I am. I guess I’ll go to sleep a few minutes. Though I’m very pleased +to see you, Mary Jane.” + +Through the hearts of all in the room shot a thrill of thankfulness, +yet nobody moved as the injured child dropped at once into a quiet +sleep which meant, the doctors knew, the saving of her life and reason. + +Mrs. McClure had kept up bravely, till that moment, but now her +strength was leaving her in the shock of her sudden relief and joy. + +“Tell the girl not to move nor draw her hand away--till Bonny herself +releases it;” she whispered, as an attendant led her noiselessly out of +the chamber. + +She did not know how long and difficult a task she had set the +unwelcome visitor; for while she herself sank into a much needed rest +the sick child still slept that deep, refreshing slumber which was to +restore her to health. + +The hours passed. The doctors went silently away. One nurse took up a +watchful position near the bed and remained almost as motionless as the +chair she occupied. A gray-haired man appeared at the doorway, took +one long, delighted look at the small figure on the cot, barely seeing +the other child beside it, and went away again. This was the anxious +father and he moved with the lightness of one from whom an intolerable +burden has been removed. + +Meanwhile, a second nurse took observation now and then of Mary Jane. +The position into which the cripple had sprung, in her eager clasp of +Bonny-Gay’s hand, was a trying one. Half-bent forward, with no support +for any portion of her body save that sidewise seat upon the foot +of the cot, it was inevitable that muscles should stiffen and limbs +ache, even in a stronger frame than Mary Jane’s. Besides that, she was +very hungry, almost faint. Her slight breakfast had been taken very +early, and since then she had not tasted any food, though it was now +midafternoon. Presently, she felt her head grow dizzy. Bonny-Gay’s face +upon the pillow appeared to be strangely contorted and the clasp of +the small hand within her own to become vise-like and icy in its grip. +She began to suffer tortures, all over, everywhere. Even her useless +legs were prickling and “going to sleep,” like any overtaxed limb. She +feared she would fall forward, in spite of all her will, and that +might mean--death to Bonny-Gay! She knew, of her own intuition, that +she must not move, even without the whispered command of Mrs. McClure, +and in her heart she began to say a little prayer for strength to hold +herself steady till her task was at an end. + +Then, all at once, she felt that the crutches resting against her side +were being noiselessly lifted away. Somebody, who moved as if on air, +was putting a rolled up pillow under her own tired chest; another at +her side--her back; and beneath the heavy feet a great soft cushion +that was like her own mother’s lap, for restfulness. + +She turned her head and looked up into the kind face of the trained +nurse and smiled her most grateful smile, for she dared not speak. +The white-capped woman smiled back and silently held forward a plate +on which was some carefully cut up food. Then she forked a morsel and +held it to Mary Jane’s lips, which opened and closed upon it with an +eagerness that was almost greedy, so famished was she. + +“How queer it is!” thought the little girl, “that anybody should bother +that way about just me!” then swallowed another mouthful of the +delicious chicken. A bit of roll followed the chicken, and after that a +glass of milk. With every portion so administered, Mary Jane’s fatigue +and dizziness disappeared till, by the time the nurse had fed her all +that the plate contained, she felt so rested and refreshed she fancied +that she could have sat on thus forever, if Bonny-Gay had so needed. + +“Oh! how good I feel!” + +Bonny-Gay was awake at last, and, of her own accord, withdrew her hand +from Mary Jane’s clasp. + +“Why--why, is that you, Mary Jane? Why doesn’t somebody make it light +in here? How came you--Oh! I remember. You came to see me and I went to +sleep. I don’t know what made me do that. Wasn’t very polite, was it? +Now, I’ll get up and be dressed and then we’ll play something.” + +But as she tried to rise she sank back in surprise. + +“That’s queer. There’s something the matter with me. One of my legs +feels--it doesn’t feel at all. Seems as if it was a marble leg, like +‘Father George’s.’ Whatever ails me?” + +Mary Jane’s answer was prompt enough, though the nurses would have +suppressed it if they had had time. + +“I guess it’s broken. That’s all.” + +“Broken! My leg? What do you mean?” + +“Oh! I forgot. You haven’t been real awake since it happened. Max--” + +“Child!” interposed the nurse who had fed her. + +“Oh! mustn’t I tell?” + +The two white-capped women exchanged glances. After all, their patient +would have to learn about her own condition; and children had often +ways of their own which proved wiser than grown folks thought. + +“Ye-s, you may tell.” + +“You were thrown out the carriage. Don’t you remember? Max had run +away to find you, and when he did, he didn’t stop to think of anything +else. He just jumped right into the carriage, where you and the Gray +Gentleman and the baby and I were all riding splendid. That made the +horses afraid and they acted bad. You got tumbled out and broke your +leg. That’s all.” + +“That’s--all! Why, Mary Jane! You say it as if--as if--you didn’t care!” + +Bonny-Gay began to cry, softly. + +“Yes I did say that’s all, because that isn’t much. It’s a good job +it wasn’t your head. A broken leg gets well quick; quicker’n ever if +it’s only a little leg like yours. If it was your mother’s now, or +your father’s, you might worry. But, my sake! I wouldn’t mind a little +thing like that if I were you. To lie in this heavenly room, with all +the pictures and pretty things, and folks to wait on you every minute, +why--I’d think I was the best off little girl in the world if I were +you.” + +“But I can’t walk on it, nobody knows when. Nor go out-doors, +nor--nor--I think you’re a mean girl, Mary Jane Bump!” + +The cripple was too astonished to reply. She had pushed herself from +her hard position upon the cot’s foot to a chair which the nurse had +placed for her, and was leaning back in it with supreme content. In +all her little life she had never sat upon anything so luxurious and +restful. How could any child mind anything, who was as fortunate as +the daughter of such a home? Astonishment, also, at finding that her +new friend was not wholly the “angel” she had hitherto supposed her to +be, kept her silent. But she was rather glad to find this out. It made +the other girl seem nearer to her own level of imperfection, and she +speedily reflected that sick people were often cross, yet didn’t mean +to be so. + +Bonny-Gay herself swiftly repented her hard speech and looking around +the room, inquired: + +“Did I sleep very long?” + +“Yes, dear, a long time. We are all so glad of that,” answered the +nurse, holding a spoon to the patient’s lips, just as she had done to +Mary Jane’s, who laughed outright exclaiming: + +“That was the funniest thing! When I was holding your hand, Bonny-Gay, +she fed me just that way, too! Me! Mary Jane Bump! Chicken, and biscuit +and milk! ’Twas prime, I tell you!” + +“Fed you? Why?” + +“’Cause I was holding your hand and couldn’t feed myself. I s’pose she +thought, maybe, I was hungry. I was, too.” + +“Did you hold it all the time I was asleep, Mary Jane?” + +“Yes. Course. You wasn’t to be waked up till you did it yourself.” + +A moment’s silence; then said Bonny-Gay: + +“I am too ashamed of myself to look at you. What must you think of me, +Mary Jane?” + +“I think I love you, dearly.” + +“I don’t see how you can, but I’m glad of it. Where is my mother, +nurse?” + +Mrs. McClure bent over the cot and kissed her daughter, murmuring +tender words of love and delight; and for a space neither remembered +Mary Jane. + +However, she had just remembered her own mother and the fact that she +had been long from home. Also, that that home lay at the end of a long, +strange and distracting journey, for one so ignorant of travel as she, +and that through the window she could see that it was already twilight. +She waited a bit, for a chance to bid good-night to Bonny-Gay and to +say how glad she was that she was better, and to thank the nurse for +being so kind to herself. But nobody seemed to have any thought for her +just then. + +The gray-haired father had come into the room and bent beside his wife +over the cot where lay their one darling child; and, seeing the parents +thus occupied with their own feelings, both nurses had considerately +turned their backs upon the scene and were busying themselves in +arranging the chamber for the night’s watch. + +“I dare not wait a minute longer! I should be afraid, I think, to get +in the car alone at night. I was hardly ever out after dark. I’d like +to make my manners pretty, as mother said, but I can’t wait.” + +Moved by the same delicacy which had made the nurses turn their +backs upon the group at the bedside, Mary Jane silently picked up +her crutches and hopped away. Finding the way out was easier, even, +than finding it in. The halls were now all lighted by wonderful lamps +overhead and the same stately footman stood just within the outer +entrance. + +“However did such a creature as this get in and I not see her?” he +wondered, as the little hunchback came swiftly toward him. “Well, +better out than in, that’s sure. No knowing what harm it would do the +little missy if she caught sight of an object like that!” + +Which shows how little the people who live in one house may understand +of each other’s ideas; and explains the rapidity with which he showed +Mary Jane through the door and closed it upon her. + +After the lighted hallway the outside world seemed darker than ever, +even though the days were yet long and twilight lingered. But to-night +the sky was clouded and a storm impending. Already in the west there +were flashes of lightning, and though, in ordinary, Mary Jane delighted +in an electric storm, just then it made her think the more longingly of +home and its security. + +“Besides, if I should get my fresh clean dress all wet, that would make +work for mother. I’m glad I forgot that hat, though. That’ll have to be +dry, anyway, now; and maybe after all, when Bonny-Gay gets well she may +want it herself. It was her mother gave it to me, not her. Now which +way--I guess this. Oh! I know! I’ll find that gardener, Mr. Weems, and +he’s so nice and kind he’ll show me the way to go. Maybe, after all, +there is another car goes nearer to Dingy street than that one I took +first and--There’s a man. It might be him. I’ll run and see.” + +But when she had clicked across the path to where the man stood he had +already begun to move away, and she saw that he was not at all like the +gardener. So she paused, irresolute, trying to recall by which of the +several avenues leading from it she had entered the Place. + +There were people hurrying homeward in each direction, and a few smart +equipages were whirling past; but nobody paused to glance at her, save +with that half-shudder of repugnance to which she was quite accustomed +when she met strangers, and that had rarely wounded her feelings as it +did just then and there. + +“Well, I can’t help that. And I don’t mind it for myself, not now at +all, since I know about poor father. He’s the one feels worst for it. +And that I shall tell him the very minute I see him. So let them look +and turn away, if they wish. Looks don’t hurt, really, and oh! dear! if +I only could remember the street I ought to take. Charles, of course. I +know that and there it is; but whether to go to that side or this--” + +In the midst of her perplexity the electric current was turned on and +the Place was suddenly and noiselessly flooded with a light as of day. +Courage came back and after another hasty scrutiny of the streets, to +discover some landmark that she could recall, she saw the monument and +the lion, and ran toward them as if they had been old friends. + +“Bonny-Gay loves them, and so does the Gray Gentleman, and they do look +as quiet and peaceful as can be. I stopped there, I know, and maybe +I’ll think it out better there.” + +Yet even in that reposeful place Mary Jane could gain no new ideas as +to her course, nor was anybody near to whom she could apply. + +The gardener had long since gone home for the night, and in +desperation, Mary Jane determined to appeal to the very first person +who came by. This proved to be a young man, with a cane and eyeglasses; +and he appeared to be extremely busy. The little girl thought he +must also be one of the “aristocratics” of whom her father spoke so +contemptuously, because when she had asked him to “please tell me the +way to Dingy street?” he had scarcely glanced at her but had haughtily +replied: “Never heard of such a place.” + +“Hmm. Too bad. Father says they don’t any of them know very much, and +I’m sorry. Don’t know where Dingy street is, indeed! when I know it +myself, even a little girl like me and have lived there always. I mean +ever since I was a baby and we left the country. That, mother says, +was the mistake we made. In the country father didn’t drink and lose +his work. Well, we’ll go again, some day, when I get big and strong, +and can help more with the wash. We could earn a lot, mother and me +together, if I was big.” + +She lost herself in her day dreams for a little and awoke from them +with a start, to find the twilight altered to real night, while the +electric gleams from the lamps overhead were brighter than ever and +their shadows more like ink upon the pavement. Mary Jane had never seen +such brilliancy as this, and again she forgot herself in studying her +surroundings and enjoying the vivid green of the grass and shrubs. + +A certain clump of flowers, glowing in the radiance, attracted her +especially and she felt that she must put her face down on them, to +smell them, before she lost sight of them forever. + +“For I don’t s’pose I’ll ever come this way again. I couldn’t expect +it. Mother couldn’t spare the money even if she could me and--even if +I ever get back to her again!” she concluded, with a frightened sigh. +But the beautiful blossoms enticed her, and in her own down town park, +which had been thrown open to whoever of the poor would enjoy them, +there were few “Keep off” signs and the few quite disregarded. This she +had explained to Bonny-Gay; and what was true of one park in the city +should be true of all. + +So she hopped nimbly over the velvet lawn to where the flowers gleamed +scarlet and white and wonderful, and bending above them thrust her face +deep down into their loveliness. Oh! how sweet they were! and so crisp +and almost caressing in their touch upon her cheek. + +“Dear flowers! I wouldn’t hurt you, you know that, don’t you! I +wouldn’t break a single one of you, no, not for anything. Seems like +you’d feel it if your stems were broken, poor things. But I’ll not harm +you. No, indeedy. Only I wish--I wish I could just take one tiny, tiny +piece home to mother. But I wouldn’t break you, even for her!” + +“Well, I guess you’d better not! What are you doing here? How dare you +come on this grass? Can’t you read the signs?” + +Mary Jane looked up, and was immediately terrified. It was a policeman +who held her arm, and all the wild stories she had heard of arrests and +imprisonment flashed into her mind. + +In Dingy street there was, also, a policeman; but a friendly soul whom +all the children loved, and whose own home was close to theirs. It was +he who had saved many a baby’s life, from careless passing vehicles, +when busy mothers had not the time to watch them as they should; and +his blue uniform represented to Mary Jane’s mind an all-powerful +guardian, to whom appeal was never made in vain. + +But this six-foot officer, with his glitter and dignity, his harsh +voice and vise-like clutch--this was the majesty of law outraged. + +“Oh! what have I done! I didn’t mean it--I didn’t--” gasped the +frightened child, and wrenching herself loose swung away upon her +crutches, faster even than the officer could have pursued her, even if +he had been so minded. + +He did not even attempt to follow her, but watched her flight, with a +chuckle of amusement. + +“Scared her well, that time, the little vagrant. Well, it’s right a +lesson was given ’em. If every child who wanted to smell the bushes was +let, what would our parks look like!” + +“Like bits of Paradise, as they should;” answered a voice behind him, +so suddenly that the policeman wheeled about to find himself face to +face with a resident of the Place himself. + +As for Mary Jane she neither saw whither she fled nor scarcely breathed +before she had collided with a swiftly advancing figure, and found both +herself and it thrown down. Captured after all! Her eyes closed with +a snap, as there seemed to rise before them the vision of a station +house, filled with frowning policemen, and herself in the midst, a +helpless prisoner. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + +ON THE WAY HOME + + +“Well, upon my word!” + +Mary Jane opened her eyes. Then she rubbed them to see more clearly. +Indeed, she rubbed them twice before she made out her mistake and was +able to say: + +“Oh! I am so sorry! I--I didn’t mean--but I can’t be arrested! I +can’t--my mother--I--.” + +She scrambled up somehow, picked her crutches from the ground and set +off again. She dared not look behind her but was quite sure that the +hard-faced policeman was in full pursuit. Off she was, indeed, only to +be brought to a sudden stop, while a shiver of fear ran through her. +But she made no further outcry and rested quietly upon her wooden feet, +to hear her doom. + +“Why, you poor little girl! You look scared. You haven’t done any harm, +not a bit. In fact, you’ve saved me quite a chase. I’m not so swift as +you are, hard as I tried to catch you.” + +Mary Jane shivered and still said nothing, nor could she lift her eyes +from the ground. Their gaze rested idly upon the man’s feet and she +fancied that the gloss upon his shoes equalled the radiance of the +electric light. + +“And now that I have caught you, I want to thank you, with all my +heart, for your kindness to my precious child. I believe the good Lord +sent you, just in the nick of time, with your ready answer and your +readier sympathy. Yet to think that, after all this, you should run +away, at night and alone. You poor, brave little child.” + +Then she heard, through her puzzled understanding, another voice +speaking in jesting surprise. + +“Turn your back on an old friend, would you, Miss Bump! Well, we will +have to see about that, indeed!” + +Those were tones to banish fear! and now, in truth, Mary Jane’s eyes +were raised and she saw standing there and smiling down upon her none +other than the Gray Gentleman. + +The revulsion of feeling was too much for her self-control, and +dropping her face against his hand she began to cry, with all the +abandon of those who seldom weep. + +“Why, little girl! What is it? Were you so badly frightened as all +that? There, there. You’re with friends now, child, who love you and +will take care of you.” + +With that she felt herself lifted in the Gray Gentleman’s arms, and +her head forced gently down upon his shoulder, while her crutches fell +noisily to the stones. However, they were promptly picked up again by +the other gentleman, who was also gray--as to hair and beard--and who +made almost as much noise as the crutches, because he kept blowing +his nose so vigorously. Then she heard him softly slap her own Gray +Gentleman’s free shoulder and exclaim, in a husky voice: + +“It’s all right, neighbor! The Lord has been good to us. Bonny-Gay +is almost herself again and was laughing--actually laughing--to see +me, her dignified daddy, run out of her room to try a race with Miss +Mary Jane here. Oh! it’s too good to be true!” and again there was a +tremendous flourish of handkerchief, and a sound like a small fog horn. + +“Thank God!” murmured the Gray Gentleman, and Mary Jane felt him +tremble. Instinctively she raised her head to comfort him and touched +his thin cheek timidly with her lips. + +But there was no timidity in the kiss he returned her as he set her +upon the ground, and with all his usual cheerfulness, demanded: + +“Well, little traveler, how do you propose to get home again?” + +“I don’t know!” The tone was a happy one and seemed to mean: “And I +don’t care! You are to find the way for me!” + +“You don’t, eh? But I’m thinking that good mother of yours will be +hungry for a sight of your face, and it’s time we remembered her. +Mothers are queer bodies. They like to have their youngsters around +them, be they never so bothersome. Yet, since she’s waited so long, +I think it will do no harm for her to wait a while longer. I’d like +to have you pay me a little visit, as well as Bonny-Gay, and I’ll +invite you to my house to take supper with a lonely old fellow who’ll +entertain you as well as he can.” + +It was hard to refuse, she would so much have liked to see the home of +her friend, of the friend of all the children whom she knew. But the +vision of her mother, waiting and anxious, was too much for her loyal +heart, so she declined as prettily as she knew how, only requesting: + +“Now, please, you are to tell me the quickest way home to Dingy street +and I’ll go. You must know it, for you’ve been there so often.” + +“Yes, I know it, and I’ll take you at once. I’ll do more. I’ll invite +myself to supper with you after I get there, since you can’t stop with +me.” + +“Very well,” said Mary Jane, though not with much enthusiasm. She was +afraid he would think her mother’s supper a poor one. However, he was +quite welcome to what they had, and she added more cordially: “I know +mother’d think it an honor, only I’d have to stop at the baker’s on the +way.” + +She didn’t quite understand why both gentlemen laughed so heartily. +They now seemed in a mood, each one of them, to laugh at any and +everything which happened, and Bonny-Gay’s father teased the other +a little about his great appetite, which required the contents of a +bake-shop to satisfy. Then he added, with a manner that admitted of no +denial: + +“But you’ll have to defer your visit, neighbor, till another time. I +claim the privilege of conveying this young lady to her destination, +and my man has already summoned a cab. Here it comes, now; for I’d +rather trust a city cabby to find out odd places than my own coachman.” + +Here came the cab, indeed, and from the vine-clad mansion on the corner +also came a liveried servant bearing a big basket tightly covered. + +“With the mistress’ compliments, and Miss Bonny-Gay is sending this to +the baby.” + +“Good enough!” answered the happy father, and took Mary Jane from +the Gray Gentleman’s arms; who handed her crutches in after her, and +himself closed the door of the cab with a cheerful snap. + +“Some other time, then, Mary Jane, I’ll expect a visit from you. My +regards to your mother and I will be down your way before long. +Good-by.” + +Mary Jane’s head whirled with the strangeness of it all. What a day +it had been! And how simple and kind was this gray-haired father, who +didn’t look half so strong as her own absent one, but who talked so +fast and asked so many questions that, before she at all realized what +she was doing, the cripple had given him their whole family history. +Save and excepting, of course, anything which related to her own +affliction and its cause, or any possible fault of her beloved father. + +“He works--I mean, he did work--for the B. & B. railroad folks. +He--he--isn’t working just now. He went away, for a little while, but +I guess he’s back again. Won’t he be surprised to hear all that’s +happened to me? He’ll be glad, after all, that she didn’t--Oh! my sake! +what am I saying!” + +At mention of the Company, the gentleman beside her had given a little +start of surprise, but Mary Jane fancied that the jolting of the cab +had moved him. She expressed her regret for the accident and added: + +“But I like it. I never rode in a carriage but once before. That was +yesterday when Bonny-Gay was hurt. But she’ll soon be well, now, I +think. Don’t you?” + +“So I trust. So I trust and believe. But, tell me a little further of +your father. What sort of work did he do? I happen to know something +about that company and am interested in the details of all its +concerns.” + +“Sometimes he was helping along the tracks; straightening them, +changing the ties, and such things. Sometimes he was over at the great +sheds they’re building--monstrous ones, they are, almost all of steel. +You ought just to see them by daylight. Though I guess I can show them +to you even to-night, ’cause they’re not so very far from our house.” + +“Indeed! Did you say what street it was? I heard my neighbor give some +directions to the driver for us, but paid little attention.” + +“Dingy street, number 97.” + +“Dingy street! You don’t say! Why, I know that locality well. Very +well, indeed. A great many of--of the Company’s employees live around +there.” + +“Most all of them do, I guess.” + +“So your father’s out of work, just now?” + +“Yes. But he’ll soon be ‘on’ again, I think. When he does work he gets +real good wages. That is, if he isn’t ‘docked.’ I reckon the Company is +pretty strict. My mother says they don’t allow for anything. A man must +do his task or leave it, and that’s the end.” + +“But that is quite right and just, is it not?” + +“I--suppose--it is. Though poor men can’t always--I mean, they get +discouraged sometimes. That makes them do and say things they wouldn’t +else. It’s queer and unjust, my father says, for the Company to have so +much money and their men so little. That’s what made him glad--I mean +not so sorry--when--when--things happen.” + +Mary Jane paused, confused. Twice she had nearly told this other father +that her own father had been glad when Bonny-Gay had been hurt. She +knew William Bump would not have said anything so cruel if he had not +been drinking; she was sure of that, for he was generally so kind of +heart. But even yet she did not imagine that her companion was himself +the president and head of that Company whose wages her father gladly +accepted even when he talked against it most fiercely. + +However, Mr. McClure greatly enjoyed listening to this frank story +of the underworkings of his vast enterprises. He was not only a very +wealthy and powerful man, he was also a wise and just one. He felt the +responsibilities of his position, and made it his business to know all +employees by name and character, so far as that was possible. Over this +particular portion of his affairs, right in his own city, he had an +almost daily supervision, and he knew William Bump, in some respects, +much better than this loyal little daughter did. His opinion of the +father was very poor, and he had himself given orders, on the previous +day, that the said William was never again to be taken on by his +managers, “not in any capacity whatsoever.” + +For some distance the gentleman made no response to Mary Jane’s last +remark, and the silence was broken only by the roll of their own +wheels, the ordinary sounds of the streets through which they passed, +and the increasing rumble of the thunder. The storm was drawing nearer +and he wished to escape it, if possible. He signalled the driver, after +a while, and seeming to rouse himself from some deep thought, to: “Make +haste!” + +The cabman lashed his horses into a gallop, and remembering the +accident of her one other ride, Mary Jane began to grow afraid. She was +afraid now, also, of this silent gentleman beside her and longed for +her journey to end. To pass the time she tried to count the lamps on +the street corners as they flew past her in the gloom, and to watch for +the illuminating flashes of lightning, which came faster and faster. + +Suddenly, into this silence, Mr. McClure hurled a stern question, that +compelled a truthful reply, whether she liked to give it or no. + +“Mary Jane, of what was your father glad when that accident occurred?” + +She caught her breath in alarm; then answered, frankly: + +“He was glad because--because Bonny-Gay was hurt.” + +“Why?” + +“Oh! I don’t know. I mean--I guess he was so sorry about me--being like +I am--and he thought it wasn’t fair. She was as beautiful and perfect +as I was--was ugly; and her father had all the money and he had none. +But it wasn’t right and it wasn’t him. Indeed, indeed, it wasn’t. He +didn’t know you, of course, and he didn’t dream that you could love +her same as he loves me. But he’d be the first--the very first--to be +sorry, after he came to himself.” + +“Hmm. No man, rich or poor, has a right ever to be other than himself.” + +“I suppose not. But things haven’t gone right with father since we came +from the country.” + +“Humph!” was the contemptuous comment, and the little girl said no more. + +Oh! if they would only ever get to 97 Dingy street! Twice, now, she had +been allowed the luxury of a carriage ride and each time how wretched +she had been. At first she had liked Bonny-Gay’s father almost as much +as she had the Gray Gentleman, when she first knew that good friend. +She had chattered away to him almost as freely; yet after awhile he had +allowed her to keep up the chatter rather for his own information than +because he had seemed interested in her affairs. He was now become so +stern and indifferent that she realized she had deeply offended him. +To her relief, the cab turned sharply around the next corner and there +she was, at last, in dear, familiar Dingy street, with its tiny houses +that were yet homes; in one of which was mother Bump, her four sisters, +and the wonderful baby! Possibly, also, her father; though of him she +thought less, just then, than of the motherly face which was, to her, +the comeliest in all the world. + +The cab stopped with a jerk. The cabman leaped down and opened the +door. Then he lifted out the covered basket, and afterward swung Mary +Jane to the ground and supported her till the gentleman who remained +inside the vehicle handed out her crutches. + +The house door flew open, also, at the sound of wheels, and Mrs. Bump +peered out into the night. + +“What is it?” she called, her voice trembling with anxiety. That a +carriage should stop before her humble home foreboded harm to some of +her loved ones, and her first thought was of her crippled daughter. + +“Here am I, Mother! Home at last;” answered that daughter’s voice, +cheerily. + +Then she turned to thank Mr. McClure for his kindness to her, but he +did not hear her, apparently. The cab was already being whirled around, +and the driver lashing his horses. A brilliant gleam of lightning, +followed instantly by a terrific clap of thunder, startled them into a +thought of shelter only. Mrs. Bump saw through the cab window that the +gentleman raised his hat, then she seized the basket from the ground, +and hurried Mary Jane indoors, just as the first great drops of a heavy +shower came dashing down. + +“Oh! mother Bump! I never saw such a lovely place as this dear old +home! How glad I am to be here. Has father come yet?” + +“Not yet, dearie. But he will soon, no doubt.” + +“I hope he isn’t anywhere out in this storm; poor father.” + +“Bless you, child! The man has sense, hasn’t he? Even dumb creatures +know enough to go in when it rains. But tell me fast, darling, all +that’s happened to you since you went away. My heart! this has been the +longest day I ever knew! have you had anything to eat? What made you +so late? How came you to be riding home in such grand style? and where +got you this basket?” + +“It’s the baby’s, mother. Bonny-Gay sent it to him;” cried the happy +girl, running to seize that crowing infant from his trundle-bed and to +cover his face with kisses. Then she dropped her crutches and herself +upon the floor, drew the baby to her lap, and from that lowly position +began a swift, but rather mixed history of events since she had said +good-by and hopped away in the morning. + +The mother listened, losing never a word, and deftly simplifying +matters now and then by a leading question, while at the same time she +explored the big basket. It had evidently been filled in haste, and by +the direction of Bonny-Gay, herself. + +“This is for the _baby_, is it?” laughingly demanded Mrs. Bump, lifting +out a great loaf of rich cake, carefully wrapped in waxed paper. “Fine +food for a year-old, that is. And this? and this? My heart, but whoever +filled this basket had a generous streak!” + +A fine roasted chicken, mate to that of which Mary Jane had already +partaken, it might be, followed the cake. Then came a picture-book, +a jumble of toys, a box of candy, and an odd mixture of the things +nearest at hand, and of which the sick child could think. + +But crowning all these gifts, and the only one packed with any attempt +at care, was the beautiful leghorn hat, with its nodding ostrich plumes +and its general air of elegance. + +“The darling, the darling! She did mean me to keep it, then!” cried +Mary Jane, so delightedly that the baby immediately pat-a-caked with +noisy vigor. + +Of course, even though they had long since enjoyed their ordinary +supper, the watchful children were not to be put off without at least +a taste of the baby’s good things; so the mother cut and divided with +exact equality; and after a feast so hilarious that it brought Joe +Stebbins in from next door to see what was the matter, everybody was +sent to bed; even the tired Mary Jane, whose heart seemed brim full of +both joy and anxiety. + +She had explained to her mother how she had chattered to Mr. McClure, +hiding nothing, even her unwise statement of William Bump’s animosity +toward the other, happier father. + +Mrs. Bump had listened quietly, and she had pooh-poohed the little +girl’s regrets! but her heart sank. Mr. McClure was the name of the +head of the Company. She knew that, though Mary Jane did not; and +she realized that her husband’s last chance of reinstatement in the +Company’s employ had been ruined by the very one who would have +sacrificed her very self to do him good. + +“Poor little daughter! But she must never know. Never. It would break +her loving heart! And it matters little now whether William comes home +or not!” sighed the troubled wife and mother, as she laid her own weary +head on her pillow for the night. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +CONFIDENCES + + +“Oh! I am so tired! If I could only just get up once!” sighed Bonny-Gay. + +“Sick folks always have to stay in bed. How’d they look, sitting up, +I’d like to know?” answered Mary Jane. + +“But I’m not sick. I’m not sick one bit. I’m just as well as--as that +parrot, yonder.” + +“Tell the truth, tell the truth, tell the truth!” shrieked Polly. + +Mary Jane laid down the thirteenth doll and clapped her hands to her +sides. “That bird is the absurdest thing. He makes me laugh till I +ache.” + +“That’s a story, that’s a story!” corrected Poll. + +“No, it isn’t! No, it isn’t! No, it isn’t!” mocked Mary Jane, gaily. + +Bonny-Gay laughed, too, and cried out: + +“Mary Jane, you’re the very nicest girl I know!” + +“Thank you. That’s a dear thing for you to say. But you’re partial, +like mother. Besides, there isn’t any other girl here, just now.” + +“But I mean it. There isn’t another girl in the world would come here +and be shut up in the house, day after day, just to amuse me, ’cause my +leg’s broken, except you.” + +“Yes, there is,” said Mary Jane, confidently. + +“Who?” + +“You!” + +“Oh! you funny child!” + +“Wouldn’t you? If you and I were each other--I mean changed places and +I was the sick one, wouldn’t you?” + +“Maybe. I don’t know. I never did like indoors and would never stay in +if I could help it. Do you s’pose it will be very long now?” + +“No, I guess not. Not if you’re good and lie still. Wait. I’ll bring +all the playthings around to that other side the bed and that will rest +you. You’ve been looking out this way a good while now.” + +So Mary Jane industriously hopped around and transported the thirteen +dolls, the bird cages, and the parrot stand to a new position, and +leaning on her crutches gently helped the sick child to turn about as +far as she was permitted to do. A trained nurse was still always in the +room, and Mrs. McClure herself passed in and out very frequently; but +it was Mary Jane who did most for her friend; Bonny-Gay declaring that, +“Next to Mamma” there was nobody who understood her whims and desires +without being told them, as the little cripple did. + +“That’s because we’re just an age, I guess. Queer, wasn’t it? That you, +up in this big house, and me down in my dear little one, should both +be sent to our folks the very same day that ever was? ‘Sunday bairns’ +should be the best ones in the world, my mother says. Only, I wasn’t in +my Dingy street house when I came. I was in the country;” and for some +unexplained reason Mary Jane’s sunny face clouded suddenly. + +For weeks now, and because Bonny-Gay had “taken such an extreme fancy +to her”--as Mrs. McClure had herself explained to Mrs. Bump, when she +herself went to ask the favor of Mary Jane’s attendance in the sick +room--the helpful child had spent the greater portion of each day +there. It had become quite a matter of habit in Dingy street that a +carriage should roll up to the door of 97 and that Mary Jane should +go away in it; to be returned at six o’clock precisely, of the same +afternoon. Dingy street felt itself proud of this state of things, and +every householder held her head a bit higher because of it. Who’d ever +have dreamed that their own small hunchback would get to be “carriage +folks?” Well, there was no telling when such glory might not fall to +their own lot, and she’d do them all credit wherever she went, she had +such pretty, loving ways with her. That she had. + +Now, it was sometimes an inconvenience to the McClure household that +this trip must be made twice a day; and that very morning Mrs. McClure +entered the chamber to speak with Mary Jane about it. She had now +overcome her first repugnance at sight of the deformed little body and +saw only the sweet face and helpfulness. She had, also, offered Mrs. +Bump some compensation for her daughter’s “services; just the same as +any other nurse’s;” but the poorer mother gently declined. + +“If the dear Lord has given her a chance to do something for your girl, +whom she so loves, I guess He means it as a sort of compensation to her +for her own afflictions. No, indeed, Mrs. McClure, I wouldn’t like to +taint the sympathy between those two by any thought of money.” + +To this there could be no answer, and so the matter rested. + +“Mary Jane, we begin to feel almost as if you belonged with us, you +have been so kind and good to Bonny-Gay; and what do you say to staying +up here at night, now? At least for a few nights together, with then +one at home?” asked the lady, as she sat down beside the cot and +watched the undressing of the china seventh doll, preparatory to its +bath. + +Mary Jane looked up quickly, with a sort of fear coming into her +telltale face. + +“Oh! I shouldn’t like that. I mean--of course, you’re very kind--but +I’d have to go home. I would, indeed.” + +“It’s not kindness on my part, especially. I thought it might save +trouble to both sides; but, never mind. We’ll go on as usual, for the +present; though I wish you would speak to your mother about it, when +you see her, this evening. Now, Bonny-Gay, I have to go out. Is there +anything you fancy, that I can bring you? I shall be at market and do +some shopping. Think and see, darling.” + +Bonny-Gay’s eyes had rested searchingly upon Mary Jane’s face. She +would have been delighted herself if her playmate could have remained +all the time in the Place, but she saw the sudden fear and was puzzled +by it. Yet she did not urge the matter, and the only request she made +of her indulgent mother was: + +“Just bring something new for the baby.” + +Again Mary Jane’s face was troubled and she exclaimed: + +“Please, Bonny-Gay don’t! He has too many things already, that you have +sent him. I’d rather not, please.” + +“Very well,” said Mrs. McClure, as she kissed her little girl and went +away. But she was considerably annoyed. She felt that she did not +exactly “know how to deal with that class of people,” to which Mary +Jane belonged. She wished that Bonny-Gay had not taken this absurd +fancy of hers. She wished that the Gray Gentleman had never done that +unwise thing of carrying her daughter into the region and knowledge of +Dingy street. It was all very well for him to devote his time still, +as he had all his life and fortune, toward making the lives of poor +children brighter. Everybody must have a hobby, and that was his, she +supposed. Of course, he was a noble man, and his name was known far +and wide as that of a philanthropist. Still--Hmm. It would soon end, +anyway. Bonny-Gay was improving rapidly, and was so perfectly healthy +that there was nothing to fear. And if she needed her own carriage that +evening, and Mary Jane remained still obstinate, she must be sent home +in a cab. That was all. + +With these thoughts she departed, but she had in some way left an +altered atmosphere behind her. Her difficulty in understanding “that +class of people” arose from the simple fact that she had, as yet, no +real sympathy with them. It seemed to her that they were altogether +different from herself; that they were duller, less capable of any true +nobility. But she was, in reality, kind and good at heart, with many +social cares to tax her nerves, and she was one day to have her present +ignorance enlightened. + +In the silence that followed her exit, Bonny-Gay’s hand stole softly +out and touched Mary Jane’s cheek, down which a tear was rolling. And +in the child’s touch was that perfect sympathy which the mother’s tone +had lacked. + +“Don’t cry, Mary Jane. He’ll come back.” + +Mary Jane’s head lifted instantly and her face brightened. + +“How’d you know ’twas that I was thinking about?” + +“Oh! I knew. After a minute. Not just at first. Mother didn’t +understand. I don’t s’pose she’s heard yet that he was gone. Move up +nearer. Fix yourself comf’table. Let’s talk, instead of play dolls, +now.” + +Mary Jane pushed her low chair to the side of the cot, so close now +that she could rest her head against Bonny-Gay’s own pillow. + +“Tell the truth, tell the truth, tell the truth!” admonished Polly, +and in their laughter at his opportune command they failed to hear +that somebody had entered the room and sat down quite near them. This +was Bonny-Gay’s father, and he liked sometimes to surprise her by an +unexpected visit of this sort, as well as to listen to the innocent +chatter of this pair of “Sunday bairns.” + +“How long is it, Mary Jane?” + +“It was the very day you were hurt. Two whole weeks.” + +“Well. That’s all right. Max is with him, isn’t he?” + +“I don’t know. He went away with him. They both felt bad, I guess. That +made them like to be together. Father’s powerful fond of dogs, any way.” + +“And of the country, you said, too. I s’pose he’s in the country +somewheres.” + +“But where! I do want to see him so much. There is something I must +tell him. Something he thinks is wrong, something that made him feel +bad but should not. Something--Oh! I’ve seen all through things so +clear, since he went. Every time he saw me I s’pose he was reminded +that--My sake! What am I saying. But I’m so sorry about your mother not +liking to send for me. I must have bothered her no end. I wouldn’t have +come only--” + +“You wouldn’t have come? Why, it was I who wanted you, who must have +you. Don’t you know, you are my ‘twin sister?’ It’s all right. Mother +would give me anything to have me pleased. Don’t think a thing about +that. Let’s talk about the rest. Say, Mary Jane, say!” Excitedly. + +“There you are. Off you go! Have a care!” warned Polly. + +“Oh! keep still, you bird. Listen, Mary Jane. You know I’m going to the +country, don’t you? We all are, just as soon as I get well.” + +“Yes. I think it will be just lovely for you.” + +“For you, too, you go with me and--find him!” almost shouted Bonny-Gay. + +“Oh! you darling! Might I?” + +“Course. Why shouldn’t you? My father owns a lot of country. Ever and +ever so much. He has so much he says it’s a sin and shame it isn’t +doing anybody any good. But he’s too busy to tend to it himself and he +can’t trust many folks. They would waste his money, dreadful. There’s +our big house and park, and all the gardens and things; and then there +are fields and fields and fields. Miles of them, I guess. Just as like +as not he’s gone around there some place. Just supposing! If he has, +why, pooh! You could find him in a minute. Oh! you must go with me and +look. It won’t be so long, maybe. If this old leg would only get itself +well. I love the country. It’s all out-doors there.” + +Mary Jane said nothing, but her face was rapturous with anticipation. +Finally, Bonny-Gay announced: + +“I guess that’s all settled, then. There’s nothing to do about it only +ask our folks. Let’s make believe things. Let’s pretend we had all the +money in the world and could do just what we wanted to with it; what +would you do, first?” + +“Why, I wouldn’t dare think. ’Cause it couldn’t ever come true, you +know.” + +“Supposing it couldn’t? The things that don’t come true are the +sweetest things there are, I think. You begin.” + +Mary Jane drew a deep breath. Under the inspiration of this other more +imaginative child, she was fast forgetting the hard, dry facts of life; +and whether this were best or no, it was, at least, delightful. + +“Well, I’d go to your father and I’d pay him money, and I’d get all +those miles and miles of country to do with exactly as I pleased. Then +I’d take some more of the money and I’d get the men that build houses +to make a house, right in the very prettiest spot there ever was. Where +there was water if I could, ’cause my father, he’s so fond of fishing. +He’s quit work, lots of times, to go fishing down the bay. I’d buy him +a fish-pole and lines and hooks. I’d buy him and mother a cow and a +horse and a market-wagon. They had a market-wagon once, but a man came +along and told him he could make more money in the city; and he sold +their things and lost the little farm and came. He’d be all right if he +was back in that country, I guess. I’d like to see it, myself.” + +The eager speaker stopped short. Again she had almost revealed what +no loyal daughter should,--a parent’s fault. But Bonny-Gay was so +interested, she seemed so to know beforehand what was in a body’s mind +that words slipped out of themselves. + +“Have a care. Tell the truth!” adjured Polly. + +“Of course I will,” answered the cripple. “Now, Bonny-Gay, it’s your +turn. What would you do if you had all the money and could?” + +The unseen father leaned forward a little. He was profoundly interested +in any possible desires his darling might express, and, for the matter +of that, she rarely did ask for anything. Maybe, because almost all +desirable things came to her without the asking. + +“I hardly know. Yes, I do, too. I’d buy all the parks in this city and +in every other one. I’d hunt up all the little children in the cities. +I’d make free ‘Playgrounds’ for them, every one. Even the little girls +should have their little cunning ‘farms,’ just the same. I guess they’d +want to plant flowers, though, wouldn’t they? instead of cabbages +and limas. Then I’d take all the grown-ups who wanted to go into the +country and couldn’t, and I’d send them. And I’d let them stay a whole +week, I guess. If I could. If there was room enough. And when Christmas +came I’d have everybody that was poor come to my house, just like the +Gray Gentleman does to the halls he hires, and I’d make them as happy +as--I am. I wouldn’t let anybody in the whole wide world be sick nor +sorry; I wouldn’t let anybody hurt nice dogs or turn them out of their +own parks; and--Oh! Mary Jane, do you s’pose we’ll ever see dear old +Max again?” + +“Why, Bonny-Gay? Didn’t you just make me feel ’t he was right with +father? Course, then, when father comes he’ll come; and if you aren’t +well by that time I’ll coax father to lead him up here to see you. If +he’ll be coaxed;” she added gravely. + +The child on the cot glanced through the window. “There goes the Gray +Gentleman, to see ‘Father George’ and the lion. I wish he’d come to +see me; but he’s afraid my mother blames him for taking me that day, I +think, though nobody ever said so.” + +“I’ll go ask him!” + +Before she could be stopped, Mary Jane hopped across the room and down +to the door. Mr. McClure rose with considerable noise and approached +the cot. He had been deeply touched by the fact that neither of the +two innocently dreaming “Sunday bairns” had planned anything for her +own especial gratification. The witness of such unselfishness was +refreshing in a world such as that wherein most of his waking hours +were passed. + +“Well, little woman, how goes it? Getting well, fast?” + +Bonny-Gay held up her arms to be loved. + +“Fine, father dear. It won’t be long before I’m out in the park again, +watching for you to come home from business.” + +They found so much to say to each other that they quite forgot Mary +Jane; who had, indeed, swung across the square to intercept the path of +her friend. She had something of her own to say to the Gray Gentleman +besides delivering her playmate’s message. She was in trouble and knew +that he would help her in some way too wise for her to think of. + +“Well, upon my word! If here isn’t Mary Jane! I thought I heard a +cheerful little clicke-e-ty-click, such as only one small energetic +body could make. What’s it now, Miss Bump?” + +“I’d like to talk to you, please.” + +“Don’t doubt I need it. Yet if the ‘talking to’ is to be very severe, +I’d like to have the support of the lion. Let’s rest against him. +That’s comfortable. Now, my child--talk!” + +“First off, Bonny-Gay wants you to come and see her.” + +“Shall be delighted, I’m sure. Please make my regards to Miss McClure +and I will wait upon her at any hour she designates.” Which dignified +yet whimsical remark set Mary Jane to smiling. + +“I’m glad that’s fixed before I forgot. Because I’m in dreadful +trouble, myself.” + +“You look it!” he exclaimed, smiling into her confiding face; then +dropped his playful manner as he saw that she was really in earnest. + +Whereupon she promptly told him about Mrs. McClure and why, in +anticipation of her father’s possible return, she must, she must go +home every night. “And how can I? I mustn’t put them out--they are so +good to me. I mustn’t stay away, if Bonny-Gay needs me. There’s all the +dolls to be dressed, you see; and the canaries must be fed, or they’d +die; and Polly is about as much care as the baby. She’s always dropping +things and squawking till she gets them picked up for her--though she +throws them right straight down again. I don’t see how Bonny-Gay can be +so patient with that bird, do you?” + +“I’m sure I shouldn’t be.” + +“So, I couldn’t not come, course. And what I want you to tell me, +please, is there a shorter way I could come? So I could walk here? +’Cause I couldn’t ride in the car. We couldn’t afford that.” + +“If you would ride in the car I know, without asking, that Mrs. McClure +would be more than glad to bear the expense.” + +“But father wouldn’t like that. He never likes me to have rich folks +do things for me. He--he seems to about hate them. He wouldn’t let me +go to the Empty Stocking Trees, ’cause he does. You’re the only one +he doesn’t mind. And he likes the ‘Playgrounds’ ’cause they’re not +charity. They belong to the city and we do, same’s the rich ones. They +teach the children to work and learn farming, too. He likes that. But I +couldn’t take the money from her. I wouldn’t so displease him, even if +I had to stay away.” + +The Gray Gentleman pondered deeply. He would not offend the confiding +child by offering himself to pay her car fare. He too greatly respected +her honest pride and her loyalty to her father to do that. But, after a +moment, he looked up. + +“Miss Mary Jane Bump, once before I invited you to call at my house +and you declined. Now, I invite you again. I think I have something +there that will solve your difficulties--and my own. May I have the +pleasure? I’ll detain you from the Poll parrot but a few moments.” + +“Oh! I’d love it!” + +It was a very cheerful click the crutches gave now. The mere telling +of her perplexities had half-banished them, and Mary Jane had implicit +faith in the wisdom of this simple, true-hearted gentleman, who was, +as Mrs. McClure had reflected, “the friend of all poor children +everywhere.” + +The Gray Gentleman’s big, empty, plainly furnished house, seemed very +lonely to the little girl, whose own small home was so crowded; and +she wondered at the slowness of the one colored “boy”--as gray as his +master--who answered that master’s ring. + +“Boy, go up-stairs, please, to my bedroom. Open the top drawer of the +chiffonier and bring me all the socks you find there. You’d better use +a basket--they are many in number.” + +The “Boy” half fancied that his master had lost his common sense, then +leaped to the conclusion that this was probably one of their many +pensioners upon whom the articles demanded were to be bestowed. He +obeyed without comment, however, save by a respectful bow; and soon +returned. Meanwhile Mary Jane had been shown the few pictures upon the +walls and told their stories, and the place had begun to seem more +cheerful to her. + +The “Boy” was dismissed; the basket heaped with fine hosiery placed on +the table beside the visitor, and herself bidden to look the contents +over. + +“What do you think of them, Mary Jane?” + +“I never knew one person have so many stockings; and, my sake, there +isn’t a single pair but has a hole in it--not one single sock, even. I +know. I guess you want me to mend them for you, don’t you? I often help +mother with the darning. She thinks I can do it quite well.” + +“I’m sure you can, and that is just what I do want. I cannot put on a +ragged garment, poor old fellow though I am. They always come from the +laundry, broken somewhere, and I am always buying new. That’s how I +have so many. If you want to save my money for me you can do it.” + +“I’d love to! I’ll take them home and fix them nights, after Bonny-Gay +is through with me.” + +“Let’s be business like, Miss Bump. What would be your charges, per +pair?” + +“My--charges? Nothing. I’d be so _glad_ to do something for you, who +have always been doing things for me.” + +“I’ve known you a few weeks, little girl, and I’ve done very little. +Will five cents a pair be satisfactory?” + +“I couldn’t take so much. I couldn’t take anything.” + +“That or nothing. I’m business. That would make you quite independent +of all help except your own, and be a great benefit to me.” + +“Of course, then. And oh! thank you!” + +“Now, pack up your work, little bread-winner, and let’s back to +Bonny-Gay.” + + + + +CHAPTER IX + +BY THE STRENGTH OF LOVE + + +The days sped by. The summer heat deepened and there were thankful +hearts in the vine-covered mansion in Mt. Vernon Place. For Bonny-Gay +was well again; able to run about her beloved park, and to play in the +shadow of the lion with the few children left still in that part of the +city. + +Nearly all the big houses were now closed, however, and their owners +departed to seashore or mountain. The McClures themselves were making +preparations for their own summer flitting to the great country house +of which the little girls had talked. They would have still enjoyed +being together, but that could no longer be. + +A very few days after Mary Jane had made her business contract with +the Gray Gentleman, and he had himself spoken to the conductors of +the cars upon which she would have to take her daily ride--so that +everything was made easy and safe for her--those rides had ceased. +William Bump returned as suddenly as he had departed, and, with all his +old enmity against more fortunate folk, had immediately forbidden them. + +But Mrs. Bump had herself gone to Mrs. McClure and explained enough of +matters to prove that Mary Jane was neither ungrateful nor forgetful; +and Mrs. McClure had accepted the explanation with great cheerfulness. +It was a much easier way out of a difficult position than she had +anticipated; because Bonny-Gay still talked about inviting Mary Jane +with them to the country, and this her mother did not at all desire. + +However, a compromise was effected. Mary Jane was to be asked to care +for the thirteen dolls, the two canaries, the aquarium, and Polly; only +the pony being allowed to accompany his little mistress on her summer +outing. So, one morning, the carriage came around again and all these +creatures were stowed in it, along with Bonny-Gay and a maid. They had +been taken straight to Dingy street, where they were left with many +injunctions and much sage advice, as to their proper care. Then the two +little “Sunday bairns” had kissed each other many times, and had torn +themselves weeping from each other’s embrace, while the dignified maid +looked coldly on, urging: + +“If you please, Miss McClure, you would much better be going. The train +goes at two o’clock and there’s much to pack, still.” + +“Very well, Hawkins. I’m coming. Good-bye, Mary Jane, dear, dear Mary +Jane! I’ll write you as soon as I get there and maybe, maybe, your +father and my mother will let you come out to our house and make me a +beautiful long visit. I’d teach you to ride on the pony just the same +as if your legs were good, or in the goat cart or--” + +“Come, come, Miss Bonny-Gay!” called Hawkins. + +The coachman cracked his whip, there was a last glimpse of a bare sunny +head thrust from the carriage window, the tossing of ecstatic kisses, +and Bonny-Gay had passed out of Mary Jane’s life, probably forever. +That is, if the intentions of her parents could be carried out. When +they returned, in the autumn, a man could be dispatched for the dolls +and things, if their owner still desired them. If not, they might +remain the property of the small Bumps, and so well rid of them. The +parrot had been misbehaving of late, and using expressions not wholly +suited to the proprieties of Mt. Vernon Place. Originally owned and +trained by a man of the “slums,” she was returning to the rude speech +of earlier years. + +But she was well received in the Bump household, save by William, +its head. He had frowned upon the coming into it of Bonny-Gay’s +treasures and only consented to the arrangement because of Mary Jane’s +disappointment. For ever since his return the father and daughter had +been always together and each seemed doubly anxious to do nothing that +would give the other pain. And after a time, even he became interested +in the queer bird and joined his children in inciting it to talk; +though his interest was not fully won until there sounded along the +street a familiar cry, to which nobody paid much heed except Polly. + +She was suddenly transformed. She fluttered her feathers, stretched +her neck, cocked her head on one side, and in a tone that was almost +human in its mimicry burst forth: + +“Crab-crab-crab-crab--crab-crab-crab! Devil-devilled-devil-devilled-crabs! +Heah’s-de-crab-man! Is yo’ hongry? Crab-man-goin’-to-baid-now! Dis yo’ +las’ chance for yo’ nice-fried-hot-fried-devil-devilled-crabs! C-R-A-B-S! +OU-OU-OUCH!” + +After which remarkable exploit mistress Polly became the idol of Dingy +street and even of William Bump. + +The disposition of her new charges, so that they should not take up +too much space in her little home, and the careful packing away in the +top-cupboard of the food Bonny-Gay had provided for her pets, kept Mary +Jane busy all morning; and her mother had dinner on the table before +she observed how the time had flown. But when she heard the cheerful +summons: + +“Come, father. Come children!” and smelled the freshly cooked fish, she +realized that she had given more attention than she meant to her new +cares. + +“Oh! mother, I didn’t think I was so long! And I wanted to get my part +of the ironing done; because I promised Bonny-Gay that I’d go to the +park, if you could spare me, and watch her train go by. It’s that fast +express, that whizzes so; but she’s to sit on the park side the parlor +car, she called it, and she’s to watch for me and I for her. She’ll +wave and I’ll wave and that will be our really last good-by. Till she +comes home again.” + +“That would be how-de-do? Wouldn’t it, child? And the ironing’s all +right. I’ve done that so, if father wants to go watch the men this +afternoon, you can go with him. Now eat your dinner and be thankful for +all your blessings.” + +Everybody was always hungry at that table and the dinner was soon over. +Then William Bump arose, put on his hat, whistled to a big black dog +who lay on the doorstep and started off for his afternoon of loafing. + +Mary Jane watched the pair with a pitying love. + +“Those two seem just alike, some ways, don’t they mother? Father lost +his home and his work and so did Max. Dearly as Bonny-Gay loves that +dog, ever since he got her hurt, he doesn’t want to be with her like +he used. Didn’t you notice, this morning? When she hugged him and bade +him good-by, he was just a little pleased; yet he kept one eye on +father and soon’s he could walked back and lay down beside him. Father +is dreadful good to Max, isn’t he? He often says he’d never have come +back if it hadn’t been for--for us--” + +“For you, daughter. Mostly for you, it was, dear.” + +“Well, Max helped. He staid right close and coaxing like. Oh! I do wish +the Company would give father another try.” + +“It won’t. But I’m in hopes, after awhile, he’ll find something else +to do. Meanwhile you stay close to him. Don’t give him a chance to get +down-hearted again and--you know. Didn’t you say your Gray Gentleman +was coming to the park to look at the ‘farms’ this very day? Why, +maybe, child, maybe he’d know of a job somewhere. You might ask him.” + +“Yes, I might. I will. What’s father going to do now? he’s taken to the +track.” + +“He says that, though he has no work there, there isn’t any law forbids +him sitting round, watching his old friends who have. He likes to talk +with men, you know; and if you’re handy by he’s quite satisfied. Father +doesn’t like to go wrong any better than we like to have him. He trusts +you to watch out for him, honey. So, if I were you, instead of taking +the baby and going along the street to the gate I’d go to the park by +the railroad. You can climb up the embankment at an easy place, and +stay near father. Then you’d be able to see everything. The children +in the ‘Playgrounds,’ and the Gray Gentleman if he goes to them, and +Bonny-Gay’s train when it comes, and all. Only--only, Mary Jane--take +care to give the cars plenty of room.” + +“Course I will. ‘Look out for the cars when the bell rings!’” +laughingly quoted the child. “And you look out for the parrot when the +crab-man comes! I guess you’re right. I’d better not take the baby. If +I climb up the bank I might let him slip. Good-by. I’ll make father all +right and happy, don’t you fear.” + +The mother watched her darling out of sight, thinking how sunshiny and +helpful she was, then settled the baby safely among his new playthings +and resumed her endless toil. But she was wholly happy and contented +now. They were poor, indeed, but they were not suffering, and her +hopeful heart was sure that in some way a task would be found for her +husband which would keep him out of idleness and evil company. She +began her one hymn of cheerfulness: “Lord, in the morning Thou shalt, +Thou shalt, Lord, in the morning Thou shalt hear, my voice ascending +high.” + +Meanwhile, Mary Jane had hopped along the road till she came to a part +of the railway embankment which she could climb, then scrambled to its +top. Just before her the rails were laid over a long trestle above the +deep bed of a stream, now almost dry. A little water still ran among +the stones below but Mary Jane did not look down upon that. She made +her way swiftly, yet cautiously, beside the track, pushed rapidly along +the trestle, and reached her father’s side, at the further end of it. + +“Here am I, father. I’m going to watch for the train from here.” + +“All right, daughter.” + +A fellow workman looked up and remonstrated: + +“You oughtn’t to let that girl walk that trestle, Bump. If her crutches +slipped it--the bottom’s rough and deep down.” + +“Oh! I’m not afraid. I don’t often, either, though I’ve played about +this railroad ever since I was born. All the Dingy street children play +there. How pretty the park looks, down yonder;” interrupted Mary Jane, +anxious that her father should not be blamed, especially for what was +not his doing. + +“That’s right. You oughtn’t, daughter,” he said. + +“I won’t again, then, father, if you don’t like. But I was safe enough. +What’s that team for, that’s coming?” + +“They’re going to haul off that pile of ties that have been taken up. +Company gives ’em for the hauling. Only things it ever does give, too.” + +“They ought to work faster. See. They keep dropping them on the track. +If a train should come by it would get thrown off. Don’t they know +that?” + +“Oh, they know it all right, but they’ll be in time. They’re used to +it.” + +It was in this very hardihood of custom that the danger lay. A beginner +at such a task would have watched constantly for the approach of a +train, but this “gang” did not. For the greater ease of handling they +rolled the heap of heavy ties over upon the track, as the anxious +girl had observed, and two men lifting leisurely placed the weighty, +worn out timber upon the wagon. The mule team before the wagon stood +half-over the edge of the embankment, heads dropped, themselves +enjoying the rest regardless of position. + +The men laughed and talked. William Bump joined in the chatter and +forgot Mary Jane. The talk grew more interesting, to the speakers, and +became a torture to the listening girl, though she paid no attention to +the words. She realized, merely, that they were growing more and more +indolent; the pile of ties upon the rails lessened very, very slowly. +It was already long past noon, she knew that. She was familiar enough +with the running of trains to know, also, that the through express +was the next one due. It was upon this through express that Bonny-Gay +would travel. She began to feel cold with her anxiety. She must speak +to those men, even if it should displease her father, who hated +interference of that sort. + +So she moved forward a little way and touched the arm of the foreman. + +“Will you tell me the time, please?” + +“Ten minutes to two, little girl. Pretty hot up here, isn’t it?” he +answered, good naturedly. + +“Mary Jane, don’t meddle. Children should be seen not heard.” + +“Yes, father. Only ten minutes! Why, you’ve been ever and ever so long +taking off less than half the ties. Can you finish in ten minutes? Can +you?” she demanded, eagerly. + +“Why, kid, what’s the hurry? Got another job for us, eh?” + +“The hurry? The train. The two o’clock express. It’s almost due.” + +The foreman’s face paled a trifle. Then he whistled. + +“Whew, sis, you’re right! Jim, lead that team off the bank. We’ll just +roll the rest down to the bottom and drive round there to load up. Now, +with a will! there ain’t no time to spare! here she goes!” + +The mules were led away by one man while the others exerted themselves +to clear the tracks in any and every manner possible. There was no +longer any talking. There were no false movements. They knew that +there was no way of signalling the express, just there, even if there +should be need. But there must be no need, the tracks must be cleared. +Must be! + +William Bump moved down upon the bank and watching from an apparently +safe place called upon Mary Jane to follow him. + +She did not hear him. She stood, resting upon her crutches, anxiously +watching the toilers, straining forward, as if in that attitude she +could help them, and listening--listening--with every nerve at tension. +She did not see the Gray Gentleman, who had come into the park awhile +before and having caught sight of his favorite’s pink frock, crossed +the level space from the “Playgrounds” to the embankment to see what so +interested her. As he reached the spot below the end of the trestle he, +also, began to comprehend what was passing in Mary Jane’s mind and his +own cheek whitened. + +“Hark! It’s coming--it’s coming!” cried the girl. “Work--work!” + +They did work with a will. There was no need for anybody to urge them. +They, also, heard the low rumble of wheels along the distant track, the +shiver and tremble of the rails. The heavy ties rolled down--fast and +faster. The way was almost clear. There was only one tie left and that-- + +A man turned to look over his shoulder. “The train! The train! It’s on +us!” + +The whole gang leaped to safety and waited. The one big timber still +lay crosswise above the trestle. It meant destruction. They knew it, +Mary Jane knew it. They could not move; but she could. That menacing +log should not destroy! + +Ah! but those long, strong, useful arms of hers stood her in good stead +just then. All the strength of her body was in them. The crutches went, +she knew not where. She was lying flat, forcing, pushing, compelling +that last tie down, over the edge. The train was almost there. She knew +that, also, but she felt no fear. She must do her task--she must--she +could! + +The men on the bank watched breathless, but not one went to her aid. +Even William Bump seemed stricken to stone. + +There came a crash. The log was over--the track was clear! + +But where was Mary Jane? + +As he rounded the curve just before the trestle the engineer had seen +the child upon the track, but though he instantly reversed his engine +the train could not be brought to a stand-still till it had quite +crossed the openwork space, and he stepped down from it with horror in +his heart. + +A horror which quickly changed to a shout of joy, though the peril was +yet not over. + +Again these long, strong arms had done their owner good service. As the +train came upon the trestle she slipped down and dropped between the +ties, clinging to one for her life. She scarcely heard now that rumble +and roar above her; all her consciousness was fixed in the clutch of +her fingers upon that cross-beam. + + * * * * * + +It was the Gray Gentleman who first reached the spot and prostrating +himself upon the roadbed reached down to clasp her arms and draw her up +to safety. + +“You precious child! You heroine!” + +She opened her eyes at that, gave him one radiant smile, and promptly +fainted away. Which, she afterward declared, was a very foolish thing +for a sensible girl to do. + +She as promptly revived, however, and there was Bonny-Gay hugging +and thanking her, but not saying good-by, at all! And there was Mrs. +McClure, that proud and dignified lady, snatching the crooked little +figure from the Gray Gentleman’s arms, to enfold it in her own and to +weep and cry over it in the most astonishing fashion. + +“Oh! you darling, darling child! You’ve saved our lives, saved +Bonny-Gay, who’s more than life to us. Little did I guess how noble you +are. Nobler, Mary Jane, than anybody I ever knew.” + +It was like a dream. The people, all the passengers and trainmen, +crowding round to thank and bless the little hunchback, who now rested +in her own father’s arms, while he beamed upon her, proud and happy, +but with soul-cleansing tears streaming down his softened face. And +there was Mr. McClure, laying his hand kindly upon William Bump’s +shoulder and begging: + +“For any injustice I’ve done you, for any injustice you’ve done me, let +this hour make amends. As man to man--trust me, William Bump.” + +“Aye, Boss. I will, I will and the poor man looked into the face of the +rich man and behold! it was as that of a brother.” + +“What’s all this to-do?” cried Mrs. Stebbins, to Mrs. Bump. “The +express has stopped and there’s a crowd of people coming this way.” + +“I don’t know, I’m sure. I just heard the train go by. I hope nothing’s +wrong.” + +“Not wrong, sure. The men are tossing their hats and cheering and the +women--they’re laughing and talking like they’d struck a gold mine. +They’re headed this way.” + +But Mrs. Bump was too busy to look. She had a lot of clear-starching to +do and she was engaged in a new, therefore interesting, task; she was +teaching Polly to sing a hymn! + +“Yes, you smart bird. If you can talk crab-man’s talk, that always +sounds sort of wicked, though, of course, it isn’t, you can learn +better things just as easy.” + +“So I can, so I can. Tell the truth, tell the truth, tell the truth,” +answered Polly. + +“Oh! I’m telling it, never fear. Learn it you shall. Now begin--” + +But the lesson was interrupted. The voices of the crowd were near +at hand; were at the door; were in the very room! What did it mean? +William was placing Mary Jane in her mother’s arms, as if she had been +the baby himself--helpful Mary Jane! And Mrs. McClure was clasping Mrs. +Bump’s neck, and sobbing and laughing on her shoulder. + +Everybody was talking at once, but suddenly somebody cleared a space +and placed a chair behind the startled mistress of the house. She sank +into it gratefully, her knees now trembling too much to support her. +But the facts had penetrated to her consciousness, at last, and with +a cry that hushed all speech of others, she held her precious “Sunday +bairn” to her heart with a thankfulness beyond words. + +Suddenly, upon this sacred silence, there fell a voice which seemed +neither bird nor human, yet strangely reverent and opportune: + + “Lord, in the morning Thou shalt, Thou shalt, + Lord, in the morning Thou shalt hear + My voice ascending high.” + +At this interruption there were some who wept--but none who smiled. + + + + +CONCLUSION + +AFTERWARD + + +Of course there was an afterward. There always is. + +The fallow fields of the McClure estate no longer lie idle under the +blue sky, a reproach to their owner. The property was not quite of the +“miles and miles” in extent which Bonny-Gay had imagined, but it was +still sufficient to set apart a goodly number of acres as a home for +Mary Jane, who had never known how beautiful the country was until she +was driven one day, along a smooth road, under over-hanging trees, and +over bridges crossing here and there the prettiest trout stream in the +world. The drive was interrupted, “to let the horses rest,” where there +was a fine view of a cottage, freshly painted in cream and white, and +with the most inviting of piazzas extending from its sides. + +Mary Jane had been allowed to make a little visit at the home of +Bonny-Gay, and had been absent from Dingy street for one whole week. +This day her absence was to end, even with this day; and she thought it +a little odd that Bonny-Gay should seem so extravagantly happy, as if +she were glad that the visit were over. Though, of course, the guest +knew better than that. There was not the slightest doubt in the heart +of either “Sunday bairn” concerning their mutual love. + +“Oh! what a pretty house! We haven’t come this way before, have we? Is +it on the road to the station, Bonny-Gay? How happy the folks must be +who live there. But I’m happy, too. Dingy street will seem perfectly +lovely to me when I get there. Do you suppose the baby has grown much? +I wonder if Polly has learned any new things. Mother’s a master hand to +teach, mother is. She taught me my letters while she was working round. +She thinks I can, maybe, be spared to go to school--sometime. How I +want to see her. Seems as if I could hardly wait.” + +“Oh! I’m so glad, so glad!” laughed Bonny-Gay, and even the old +coachman’s face beamed with smiles, though in ordinary he felt that it +was his business, when on duty, to conduct himself like an automaton. + +“I s’pose you’ll write to me, won’t you? You promised, that other time, +before you started, you know.” + +“No. I shall do no such thing.” + +“Bonny-Gay!” There was a volume of reproach in the tones. + +“No. Not a line.” + +“Whose house is this, do you suppose?” + +“I don’t ‘suppose’ when I know things.” + +“Whose, then?” + +“Let’s go ask.” + +“Why Beulah Standish McClure! What would your mother say? If there’s +anything she wants you to be it’s a lady. So I’ve heard her say, time +and again.” + +“So have I. I’m tired of hearing it. I mean, I’m trying to be one. She +wouldn’t care. She’d do it herself, if she were here.” + +“Never! She never, never would be so rude.” + +Bonny-Gay made a funny little grimace, then leaned sidewise and hugged +her friend. + +“Do the Dingy street folks know better how to behave than the Place +folks, missy?” + +“Yes, Bonny-Gay, I think they do”; answered Mary Jane with dignity. For +she had now been associated with the McClure household long enough to +get a fair idea of the proprieties; and she was sure that driving up +to the doors of strange houses and inquiring their owners’ names, was +not one. However, she could do nothing further, for it was Bonny-Gay’s +carriage and not hers. + +“Drive in, please.” + +So the phaeton turned into the pretty driveway, bordered with shrubs, +and around the lawn by a freshly prepared curve to the very front door +itself. Mary Jane had turned her head away and utterly refused to look. +She was amazed at Bonny-Gay, her hitherto model, but she’d be a party +to no such impertinence; not she. + +Then her head was suddenly seized by her mate’s hands and her face +forced about toward that unknown doorway. + +“Look, Mary Jane Bump! You shall look! You shall. If you don’t, you’ll +break my heart. Look quick!” + +Mary Jane’s lids flew open. Then she nearly tumbled off the seat. The +Gray Gentleman was coming down the steps, smiling and holding out his +hand. Smiling and calling, too: + +“They’ve come, Mrs. Bump! They’ve come!” Mary Jane, in her newly +acquired ideas of etiquette, wondered to hear such a quiet person speak +so loudly or jest upon such themes. She had instantly decided that this +was some friend’s country house, where he, too, was visiting. Odd that +his hostess’ name should be like her own. + +But all her primness vanished when out from that charming cottage +flew a woman with a baby in her arms. A woman in a print gown, +clear-starched as only one laundress could do it, and a baby so big and +round and rosy he had to be spelled with a capital letter. + +“Mother! My mother and the Baby!” + +“Welcome home, my child! Welcome home!” + +And the Baby cooed and gurgled something that sounded very like “Ome,” +without an H. + +“Has everybody gone crazy?” + +“Not quite!” answered William Bump, appearing from another corner. +He was as washed and starched as his wife, and had done for himself +even something more, in honor of this great occasion--he was smoothly +shaved. He looked years younger than his child had ever seen him and +oh! how much happier and more self-respectful. He had found his right +place again. He was once more a tiller of the soil; and there is +nothing so conducive to true manliness as finding one’s congenial task +and feeling the ability to accomplish it. + +Mary Jane’s head buzzed with the strangeness and wonder and delight of +it all. Yet the explanation was very simple and sensible. + +It was impossible but that the McClures should do something to evince +their gratitude to the little saver of their child’s and their own +lives and they did that which they knew would be most acceptable to +her; they gave her this home in the country. + +For the house, with its deed was made to Mary Jane Bump, herself; but +over the wide fields surrounding it her father was made overseer and +farmer, for his old “Boss,” at good but not extravagant wages. The +house had long stood empty, ever since the railroad magnate had dropped +his former scheme of agriculture on a big scale, but it was in good +repair and quite large enough to accommodate even the household of +Bump. A coat of paint made it like new and during the cripple’s absence +from Dingy street the flitting was accomplished. + +Bonny-Gay’s own summer home was near at hand, though she had driven +Mary Jane to the cottage by such a roundabout way; and her delight had +lain in her knowledge of the happiness that was coming to her friend. + +This was a year ago. As yet no cloud has marred the perfect sunshine +of Mary Jane’s new life. She now rides to school in a smart little +cart, drawn by the sedatest of piebald ponies. She is apt and ambitious +and is learning fast. Indeed, she is confidently looking forward to a +day in the future when, being both old and wise enough, she shall be +matriculated at a certain famous woman’s college; to don the cap and +gown whose ample folds shall hide, at last, her physical deformity. God +speed you, Mary Jane! and all your happy sisterhood! + + +THE END + + + + +TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES: + + + Italicized text is surrounded by underscores: _italics_. + + Emboldened text is surrounded by equals signs: =bold=. + + Obvious typographical errors have been corrected. + + Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized. + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A PAIR OF THEM *** + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will +be renamed. + +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, so +the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United +States without permission and without paying copyright royalties. +Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this +license, apply to copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and +trademark. 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