Little Miss Mouse

by Amy Ella Blanchard

The doctor coughed and wiped his eyes but he did not give up. "They will be well cared for in some institution, Hester," he said. "Or they may perhaps find good homes. You need not return them to the streets and what is left will not be enough for you three."

Miss Hester set her lips firmly. "I'll make it enough. I am not the only woman who has had to work for her living."

"But what can you do, Hester? What can you do?" said the doctor in a troubled way.

Miss Hester thought for a moment. "I can make buttonholes beautifully and do all sorts of fine sewing and embroidery. Hand-work is very much in vogue now and I surely ought to eke out my income; and then you know there is the claim," she added with a little smile.

"Pshaw!" said the doctor, as he brought his stick down hard, but he did not try to urge her further, though he shook his head and sighed.

And so it was that, with the best and choicest of her belongings, Miss Hester removed to the tiny house with its bit of front yard and its roomier back lot.

It was not long before the fine sewing daily work, was the main part of Miss Hester's daily work, for the doctor spread the information far and near that Miss Brackenbury made beautiful buttonholes and did exquisite hand-work, and that she would be willing to help out those of her neighbors less accomplished.

Then Maude Fowler came over to know if Miss Hester would help with her trousseau; Mrs. Ayres brought a dozen baby's frocks; Mrs. Baker wanted a fine shirtwaist, and so it went on till Miss Hester had about all she could do, and managed to have enough to supply the wants of herself and her adopted children, though their food was plain enough.

Billy did not forget what he had heard, and, though he never said a word of it to Ruth, he faithfully kept alive the fact that they owed a great deal to Miss Hester. He brought a cheerful presence into her life, showing an awkwardly expressed, but perfectly true, affection which Miss Hester recognized and returned.

As for Ruth, she was younger and did not show her feelings so easily. She had been brought up in a different school, too, and was used to a fond mother's caresses. To this mother's memory she clung, and Miss Hester often wondered if she cared at all for her or indeed for any one.