Midget lived with her grandmother, who was both father and mother to the little thing who had never known the care or love of either parent. Her father had never, in his best days, been much of a man, and when, soon after his wife’s death, he was accidentally killed in the factory where he worked, poor little Midget was left totally unprovided for, and quite dependent, in her babyhood, upon grandma, who at least was able to pay the small monthly rent of the cellar home to which Midget was taken. The child, because of her small size, had earned from neighbors the nickname “Midget,” and had reached the age of eight years, still answering to the title, and almost forgetting her real name was Maggie. A wild, wilful, and not far from naughty little girl she was, but her heart was kindly disposed, and held a world of good intentions and affectionate thoughts, that somehow nobody, not even grandma, could often get a sight of. She didn’t understand why there was not a little sister with whom she might play all day, instead of having to go out early in the morning to pick up sticks and chips for the fire which cooked their scanty meals.
Midget much preferred a game of “ring around a rosy” with the other children, properly called “Les Miserables,” who swarmed about the side street where she had lived so long, than to work for her daily bread and blue milk, according to granny’s directions. And poor old granny herself, possessing not much of the virtue called patience, was called upon by her idea of training a child the way she should go, to give little Midget many a “cuff on the ear,” and a shaking which roused all that was naughty in the lassie’s heart, and made the blue eyes snap very angrily. As for school, Midget had no time for education, but in some way, she, with several other children, had learned their letters, and could spell cat and dog as well as any school girl. During the day she earned a little by selling papers on the street, and yet I’m sorry to say most of her pennies went in sticks of candy down her little throat, unknown to granny. “If I only had a little sister,” she would think, excusing herself, “if granny would only buy babies, as other women do, why I’d be as good as anything, and help her take care of it! I would!”
“Eh! what’s that?”
But granny didn’t buy babies, and Midget still hated work, and sometimes there were clouds and sometimes sunshine, and on this very morning when Midget found the baby she had been saucy to grandma, and grandma had boxed the little ears, and so it had begun a very cloudy day indeed.
But we must return to Midget, who, ere this, has reached home.
How glad she was, and at the same time how frightened, poor little Midget! What should she do with the baby, that was the question; and when at last the cellar was reached, and Midget laid her burden in grandma’s lap, she asked the question over again.
“Eh! what’s this?” asked the old woman, lifting her hands and brows together, while baby, who, in all its life of eighteen months had never beheld such a queer thing as granny’s broad-frilled cap, opened its mouth and screamed a terrified answer.
“’Tain’t only a baby, granny,” exclaimed Midget, patting the wee stranger’s hands, and trembling lest her grandmother should rise and drop it. “Only nothin’ but just a baby, and I’m so glad I found it, ain’t you, granny? ’Cause you see it’s a kind of sister, you know, and you won’t have to buy one.”
“Glad?” repeated the old woman, “that I ain’t!” But the rather snappish answer was quite out of keeping with the impulsive kiss laid on the little one’s velvety cheek. Midget brightened when she saw granny do that.