THE PAPER-GIRL
On Saturday night as soon as supper was cleared away, Terence was
accustomed to make out his weekly accounts. He had a small account-book
with crisscross rulings and two fascinating little canvas money-bags,
one for coppers, the other for nickels and silver. After his book
accounts were finished, he would gravely open his money-bags and, with
banker-like precision, pile up together coins of the same
denomination--pennies by themselves, nickels by themselves, dimes, and
so on.
Though oft repeated, it was an impressive performance and one that Rosie
and little Jack surveyed with untiring gravity and respect. With a frown
between his eyes and his lips working silently, Terence would estimate
the totals of the various piles, then the sum total. He would very
deliberately compare this with the amount his book showed and then--it
always happened just this way--with a sigh of relief, he would murmur to
himself: "All right this time!"
On this particular night, instead of sweeping the money piles back into
their little bags at once, Terence paused and looked at Rosie with a
questioning: "Well?"
"Well." Rosie used the same word with a different intonation.
"I suppose I owe you twenty cents."
"Yes, Terry, you do."
"Are you having any trouble?"
With a truthfulness that made her own heart glow with happiness, Rosie
was able to answer: "No, I'm not having a bit of trouble, honest I'm
not. You're going to let me have it now regular, aren't you?"
Before Terence could answer, Ellen O'Brien, who was seated on the far
side of the table, presumably studying the pothooks of stenography,
called out suddenly: "Ma! Ma! Come here! Quick!"
Mrs. O'Brien appeared at once. She was still nursing the baby to sleep,
but no matter. Whenever her oldest child called, Mrs. O'Brien came.
"Say, Ma, I think it's disgraceful the way Terry's letting Rosie sell
papers. If I was you I just wouldn't allow it! It's awful for a girl to
sell papers!"
Rosie's heart sank. Was this comfortable income of twenty cents a week
now, at the last moment, to be snatched from her?
"Aw now, Mama," she began; "it's only right around here where every one
knows me, honest it is! This is the end of Terry's route and he gets
here so late that if I don't help him he'll lose his customers, won't
you, Terry?"
Rosie appealed to Terence, but Terence was busy scowling at his older
sister. "Say, Ellen O'Brien, what do you think you are? You mind your
own business or I'll give that pompadour of yours a frizzle!"
Ellen concentrated on her mother: "I don't care, Ma! You just mustn't
let her! How do you think I'd feel going into a swell office some day,
hunting a job, and have the man say, no, he didn't want any common
newsgirls around!"
For a moment every one was silent, overcome by the splendour of that
imagined office. Then Terence broke into a jeer:
"Aw, forget it! If Rosie was to make her living selling papers, who'd
know about it downtown? And if some one from downtown did see her, how
would they know she was your sister? Say, Sis, it's time for you to go
shine your nails!"
"Now, Ma, just listen to that! I wish you'd make Terry stop always
making fun of me! Haven't I got to keep my hands nice if ever I'm going
to be a stenog?"
Mrs. O'Brien tried hard to restore a general peace: "Terry lad, you
mustn't be talkin' that way to your sister. P'rhaps what Ellen says is
right. I dunno. We'll see what himself says when he comes in."
The young O'Briens were used to having their mother refer to their
father as one to decide all sorts of vexed questions. When he was out of
the house he seemed the person to appeal to. When, however, Jamie
O'Brien was at home, no one ever heeded him in the least. He would come
in tired and silent from his run and, after sitting about in
shirtsleeves and socks long enough to smoke a pipe, would slip quietly
off to bed. So no one was deceived by Mrs. O'Brien's manoeuver of
begging them to await their father's judgment in the matter. Rosie and
Terence would have been willing to let it mark the close of the
discussion, but not Ellen.
"I tell you, Ma," she insisted, "it's a perfect disgrace if you don't
stop it right now!"
Terry regarded his sister grimly. "Listen here, Ellen O'Brien, I've got
something to say to you: Who's been paying your carfare and your lunch
money, too, ever since you been going to this fool business college?"
Mrs. O'Brien feebly interposed: "Ah now, Terry lad, Ellen's just
borrowin' the money from you. She'll pay you back as soon as she gets a
job, won't you, Ellen dear?"
Terence grunted impatiently. "Aw, don't go talkin' to me about
borrowin'! I guess I know what borrowin' means in this house! But I tell
you one thing, Ellen O'Brien: if you don't stop your jawin' about Rosie,
it'll be the last cent of carfare and lunch money you ever get out o'
me!"
More than two-thirds of Terence's weekly earnings went into the family
coffers, so what he said carried weight. Ellen tossed her head but was
careful not to speak.
Terence rumbled on disjointedly: "Business college! Business nuthin'! I
bet all you do down there is look at yourself in a glass and fix your
hair and shine your nails. Huh!"
Ellen shrugged her handsome shoulders and, tilting a scornful nose,
returned to her pothooks.
Rosie was jubilant. She was sure Terry had intended letting her keep on,
but Ellen's opposition had clinched the matter firmly.
"So it's all settled," she told her friend, Janet McFadden, the next
day. "Just think of it, Janet--twenty cents a week!"
Janet sighed. "My, Rosie! What are you going to do with it all?"
Rosie hadn't quite decided.
Janet was ready with a good suggestion. "Why don't you save it and buy
roller skates, Rosie? I don't mean old common sixty-cent ones, but a
fine expensive pair with good ball-bearings. Then you could skate on
Boulevard Place. Why, Rosie, is there anything in the world you'd rather
do than go up to Boulevard Place with a pair of fine skates? And listen
here, Rosie: if you lend them to me in the afternoon while you're on
your paper route, I'll take good care of them, honest I will."
H'm, roller skates. The longer Rosie thought about the idea, the better
she liked it. She decided to talk it over with Danny Agin on Monday
afternoon when she left him his paper.
Danny met her with a sly grin. "Have you been chin-chopperin' some more
of them, Rosie?"
Rosie looked at her old friend reprovingly. "Aw now, Danny, why do you
always talk about that? I don't like to fight boys, you know I don't. It
was Otto Schnitzer's own fault. But, Danny, listen here: Bet you can't
guess what I'm saving for."
Danny couldn't, so Rosie explained. Then she continued:
"You see it's this way, Danny: those old cheap skates are no good
anyhow. They're always breaking. I'd give anything for a good pair and
so would Janet. We just love to skate on Boulevard Place--the cement's
so smooth and it's so shady and pretty. But do you know, Danny, last
summer when we used to go up there on one old broken skate they called
us 'muckers.' We're not muckers just because we're poor, are we, Danny?"
Danny Agin snorted with indignation. "As long as ye mind yir manners,
ye're not to be called muckers! You don't fight 'em, Rosie, and call 'em
names, do you?"
"No, Danny, I don't, honest I don't, but sometimes Janet does. She gets
awful mad if any one calls her 'Cross-back!' You see, Danny, they're all
Protestants and Jews on Boulevard Place."
"From their manners, Rosie, I'd know that!"
"But it seems to me, Danny, if we had a pair of ball-bearing skates we'd
be just as good as they are."
"Betther!" said Danny.
"So you think I'm right to save for skates, do you, Danny?"
"Do I think so? I do. Why, Rosie dear, as soon as people find out that
ye're savin' in earnest, they'll be givin' ye many an odd penny here and
there. Let me see now.... Go to the panthry, Rosie, and on the third
shelf from the top ye'll see a cup turned upside down, and under the
cup--well, I dunno what's under the cup."
Rosie went to the pantry and under the cup found two nice brown pennies.
"Thanks, Danny. But do you think Mis' Agin would want me to take them?"
"Mary? Why, Mary'd be givin' ye a nickel--she's that proud of you for
chin-chopperin' the young Schnitzer. He stones her cat, but if he does
it again she'll be warnin' him that you'll take after him. Ha, ha,
that'll stop him if anything will!"