Show 1 I 1 1 13 ES u of V aau 1 S 1 t C jl 4 OS of ike tey y A 1 41 1 1 j I 1 fec ideally a it y I 1 0 I 1 I 1 1 01 I 1 4 I 1 I 1 f a are ml if I 1 I 1 I 1 1 e I 1 WARO Pl e ARSHAL ia A cep MI isik by bacheller johnson johnan ant heller now morn went to the tha kindergarten she passed slowly along rivington street with a battered tin pall pail tn in her hand she was a tiny thing thine with 11 tile arms kaid anil legs with big hands bands and feet it was waa plain that ier bones were brittle brittie there were forty year old hollows in her seven year old pace and the pur pie circles around het her eyes might have been on the race nee of it a dissipated woman of 40 0 the tha burden of forty years of worriment too seemed to press down on her seven year old shoulders her feet dragged on the uneven sidewalk between hoc her steps thre was no offer ey cy icher in tier there was not yen even tho the energy of active misery in the poll pall was wa beer and the tha pall find its contents contenta were the key to it all it was this key that looked her into rivington street her predecessors tiac turned it on themselves vea before she ehe came into el existence she had been horn born in the prison of the slur slums is and of it IL tin palls and their contents land and glass class bottles and their contents held many pere persona tons young old and old old but all old in the dungeons of the east side high on in each side ot of her rose the tenements like ince brick cliffs between them at the top a strip of blue sky u mm so narrow that hat it lost biot its elev allne eie it was too narrow to mean health or joy or copo or heaven the sky on revington street Is as tn in as on an oil L limp lamp imp it merely int ans light down and up tile the street there aras before her arid and behind lier her a long lone pro f t B t ilk Z I 1 IN lc foa arf 3 1 4 I 1 zi I 1 I 1 k 11 J I 1 14 1 f sut norah saw none of it IL cession of it moved and moved and ever moved advanced pro gresby Kresin bd td and crossed but it began in the slums and in tho the slums there may have been those in it who had hope that by their walking and their working tind and their w weeping they might make the procession carry them beyond the gates there may have been one ot or two in it whose hope was to be grat gratified ifil td but one or two IWO count as ciphers against the mass maes tie the mass of the procession of that hat morning and of the llie morning before and of many mornings af after ter simply walk and work and do not even see tho the gates and of those abit see them almost all are beaten beck back until they lose the glimpse until they cease to hope until they forget dorcet that any gates exist arid and that Is enough of that the girl I aw none of it she thought none 1 of f it she walked and swung her pall of beer she had boen been carrying palls of beor two or three times a day for four of her seven long years the palls pails and the beer and the carrying were as much a part of her life as she was w 3 e part of the life of street it was just jost beyond chrystle street that the block doorway pawned into which she passed it was waa the entrance of one of the thousand eaves caves tn in the brick cliff A dozen other children were playing near the door and some of them yelled shrilly at her before she went in they wore were gathered about a street piano which was waa harn mering 1 out farrid familiar liar tunes dut but norah paid small email heed to their cries and did not so go I 1 closer to the piano she ehe stoically elbowed her way through the crowd hagi haggling gling over the stale vegetables vegetable s 0 on n th hie band stand by the door and went benl L into th the black hole she felt too tired to jump about with the other children or to be buffeted by passersby passers by on the sidewalk once in the hallway and out of the oll though she faced about to listen to the music and leaned in against the dirty wall to rest her weary little limbs before the climb upstairs she bhe gazed unsmilingly out at che he street which seemed as everything I 1 else had that day to be a most indefinite place she mildly wondered why it was waa that she die wanted to lie down and the from the street piano made only a vague bacue impression on her mind which wandered from one subject to another with disconcerting fickleness by and by though one of the tunes aunee caught in her brain and went ringer rin gir S on oil over and over after the p piano I 1 ano man had cone away the walk had brought a rod red spot as big as a pea into each of her cheeks and her face land and hands seemed to warm she felt little hot thrills but c ehe che he did not realize that her lassitude was anything else than weariness and she was often very tired she gave the matter little thought in tact fact her mind was slowly busy with details with bal baby shey up talas 1 11 with wondering whether bether bhe was likely 1 1 3 to be ba beaten when she dell delivered vered tho beer and above all with the thought that had in a way formed CL a background tor for all her other thoughts flits tor for many weeks tin remembrance of the one great joy of her whole little life this remembrance comforted her and was strangely vivid with her now she had not kemem remembered bared that day so clearly and with N till such dreamy pl plasce o surre and passing out of 0 the present and into the past before 71 in tact fact had tad rad a contradictory dreamy vividness since she woke ivok up two hours ago the remembrance arcamo interwoven with the pi inoa music it set itself to the cifelly c tune binally fiaai y a arnall boy with iab energy rushed out of the darkness q f from 1 om behind her and as he passed poked her roughly in the side with lits h linger finger tills aron seit her she jumped and the beer stopped over a bit she scolded at the boy much to tits lila delight and then slowly turning passed through the black blach hallway ten feet from the front door it was wholly dark but she did not ntina she had traveled the way too many times to the hallway ended at a door she opened a 1 ld id wont went across a 0 na banow biow stone paved court beyond that a 1 riar tenement rose roe like another brick din clife she went into the I 1 roar ear house housa with the tune and the memory ringing alna lue tn in tier her mind arld and slowly began to climb the etolla on the second landing site alie stopped to id rest another night flight was waa before her bor and she felt as aa if she could coula never climb it suddenly there came raa dabi the rao of a a voles voice she recognized it was anaa a sweet gentle womans comans voice and instantly the little girl with ith the beer brightened up she was no longer apathetic ti C that volca voice had blid been a part of her great happiness ills 1111 a woolstone Wools tons in there she said intensely to herself for a moment longer she listened and then with the freedom of th the e tenement tena lenit ement she opened the door little atle wider and crept shyly in she still had the bearin beer aln he her hand and was u unobserved nob until tile the rall lit swung against the door frame then the che young woman vroman who had been talking with the sweet voice to a woman by the stove looked around for 9 a second she did not recognize the little visitor her der expression showed that she had bad the faces of a great many little girls in her ber mind and that she ahe was struggling to find the name that went with this one but quickly she ehe smiled said and said why novell Noi fUi I 1 seen you in a long lone time lime and advanced the little girl with her beer said ald noo thing but there was that in the smile that she sent back to the young woman that changed tho the appearance of the tha circles around her eyes aney were no IQ longer nger like the circles around the eyes of a dissipated woman of 40 envey were merely the deep deep hollows that come with bad food and bad air childish misery and tenement fevers she looked younger too her age aee ahan dmd to simple Oc sickness kness and it ta pleas pleasa ahter teter to see a sick child than it la is to see an old child mias ills s Wo woolston tilston was close by her bi bo f fore ore she bhe saw raw the pall vard what was in it the voi aba lie college settlement are am not net surprised when they see WHO girls with beer but they do incie not like the spectacle and they do what they can to do away with tt it miss woolstone Wools tons voice was reproachful as elie ehe said you ton carrying beer again norah who la Is it tor for ma said norah 1 I suppose that lq I 1 why you yoi have not been to the kindergarten again said miss illas Wool woolston stoll at the mention of the kindergarten boraws face became even brighter 1 I mantled to come she answered she had been once to the kindergarten that visit was what she had bad remembered as she stood in the hallway norah had somehow c escaped the missionaries sion aries narles before hiss wootton came she had heard about them but they had been only a rumor to her and the kindergarten news new of which hod had drifted indefinitely to her ears eara had been a dream she had never even dreamed of it very often but one day miss wool Woo teton on met lier to r on the stairs she was carrying carryl ns beer that day too arid and heedt up to see her mother it happened that when miss woolston entered the woman was only maudlin she did not reach the ugly emge until after she had drunk the beer fiat norah brought and that was UNAS not un unell all after miss anliss woolston had bad gone so eza when the sweet lady talked to her mrs scanlan soanvan was very much impressed she wr wapl pt a great deal she promised with tremulous solemnity not to ever send nora h for beer again and she assured miss Wool woolston seton with strange irish oaths that the little girl should bo be it a regular attendant thereafter lit the kindergarten and next day of a truth IN norah did go to the kindergarten it was a fairy land to her ber a pari paradise dise nothing so pleasant as the long low room with 1 17 I 1 I 1 Z I 1 Z iral I 1 1 11 aw I 1 5 I 1 I 1 t vo 1 1 I 1 I 1 1 4 1 e r she eho scolded at the boy its chairs and its many bright clean itt t le children hall had ever come to her knowledge before no one so lovely as the son soft spoken neatly dressed smiling teacher had ever spoken to her before she S he was waa not nor at all surprised nor very resentful when it developed that because her mother had had no one to send for beer that day she could never go eo again it rhad not nolt at any time really occurred to her that sur such joy could be permanent she made no protest pr test arid and she ehe did not run away to the kindergarten when her ber mother sent her to the saloon the little girl arl with the beer was it a very near approach to a dumb animal most of the theotime time there was in her no such thing as rebellion she t took ook life as aa li it cattle came to her and it came hard bard but tn in the following days although alth the joy was vv denied her she ohe turned the day over and over tn in her mind and her slow imagination slowly put new glows and glitters on it as the reality became more and more indistinct much as the frost and the sun sometimes in winter put glories on the telegraph alre 4 and poles and on the fere escapes and eaves of the tenements the little girl with the beer had such vague knowledge of heaven that it meant to her merely a pleasant place the h kindergarten Inder garten was the pleasant est place the she N had 4 ever peen she had bad such vague ideas of angels that she insely arely thought of them h as pretty women en kind voices and gentle Ker tle touch the teachers teach erts at the kindergarten certainly seemed scent d pretty to her arid and their voices were kind and their touch gentle for these reasons it 13 1 3 true that the pleasure with which norah beard hc ard alls 4 woolstone Woolston tons 8 voice and saw ber face and fell her soft ullilee hands was most intense in her barren little mind in her empty little heart these produced which was not less than ecstacy what mica lips woolston said i about the beer or the dirty hands or the mother meant nothing to her she edid idid did not stop atop to take in the meaning of words she simply drank in the glory bof of this best face she had ever known iba basked ake rd in the brilliant har happiness of the landtr kindergarten art arten memory mer nory made doubly vivid by the actual presence of one of ithe the beings associated with lilt it the street piano tune was to this memory in her mind AS an orchestra Is to a play tn in a the themer theater mer perhaps the mental distortions that come with fever added to the of her imageries Ima geries it sit a certain that did later on but rho needed no frer fr f ver er to ninke make her very happy when sw hr had a sight of MIs ills woolston and the bound of lir hr voice and when LL a few moments later ml R Wo woolston oston wont vent with her hand in liand hand up the stairway norah was still un tin cons couscous of mere words she was bathed in the clems pleasant int eulid of a voice I 1 that ithac was as near to her as ht 1 etiny tiny conception and with the light that fell from the rear tenement I 1 tor for illuminating glory phe looked up kito into silas mins woolstone Wools loua tons race face having no llad for the j acal motion of stair glair with an a ja in hor her Ms bil eyes and around I 1 her ter lips that was moro more sincerely rapt and p nd worshipful than any that a painter ever put on car candess ivess as aa he pictured the progress Tess of an angelically conducted soul up the golden stairway stall way to tho the city of tile the BIC blest st kals alsi woolston practically philanthropic and good hearted young woman that she sha waa had no thought of all this sho she wore the earnest smile that was BBS habitual and partly mechanical with lier ter iler her mind was husy busy with resentment against the mother who had broken faith and with abstract reflections the future womanhood of such little girls as aa the ono one whose hand she ehe held A glance had been enough to tell her that the little one was overstrained over strained and III but she had no thought that the fever in the tha tiny brain had conjured con jurca jurea up tip a paradise in brown gowned miss woolston Woo laton was the angel little norall norah even after they had bad reached the two rooms that were tho the only horne home she imea even after she had from force of habic placed the pall of beer in the same broken ken backed chair even after miss woolston Wo olsion had be begun un to talk in hr her low even condemning voice to the and aid be botten mother failed to take heed of realities I 1 do nor no belleve believe that even a blow would avoid have been important enough to have brought brou clit her down from that shining kindergarten memory with its street piano tune to earth the mother again in an impressionable and stage of her dally daily course of intoxication promised anew all that hm land she yaa not surprised 0 to o find that the kindergarten was a at t hand site sha was suddenly much weaker find and a nd it pleased hel to iland that she he would not have to down stairs and through lh tho the streets to reach the splendor for a 0 moment she paused in the doorway then she passed through boldly and cloned the tha door behind her shutting out the dreary home her eyes were big and vonderine won derine cring they gazed straight ahead and auw saw things arle kindergarten liln derR irien as they revealed it to her there was warm place ard and there were wei a many alaa woolstone Wools tons in it thoi the little children whom she saw paw there were all pretty and all prepared to smile at her the blocks and col colored ored paper nith they played were very splendid and one of the faced ladles was standing guard over a glittering heap bead of them which norah knew were being saved for her she grew crew hotter better |